Saturday, January 3, 2015

In defense of the Vienna Philharmonic: a response to Norman Lebrecht

How many articles does Norman Lebrecht need to post against the Vienna Philharmonic? Since the start of the year, he has made three separate posts against the orchestra on his blog, Slipped Disc. He has asked conductors to refuse to conduct the orchestra until they hire more women. His articles have received a mixed, if predominately negative reception. No doubt he feels irked, because his latest article makes sharp jabs at his critics, who he calls "tunnel-visioned respondents". The article suggests that those who disagree with him favor discriminating.

I've taken issue with his articles from the beginning, and now that he has resorted to name-calling, I've decided to respond. Really, I'm most disappointed by his choice to assume that those who disagree with him favor discrimination. I, for one, most assuredly do not. I believe that all musicians should be judged by their merit, not by their gender or skin color. I will say up front that if the Vienna Philharmonic expands the number of women in its ranks, I will be happy for the fortunate new members.

But having said that, in recent years, the Vienna Philharmonic has indeed added more women than ever before to its ranks, as the most severe critics of the orchestra must admit. Aside from this fact, why does the reality that more men are being added to the orchestra than women signal discrimination? Has Mr. Lebrecht considered the possibility that more men than women desire a position in the orchestra? Or perhaps the most eligible candidates are men? For all the talk of discrimination, I am yet to see conclusive evidence that musically superior women are losing auditions to musically inferior men. Why can't Mr. Lebrecht provide such evidence, instead of calling his critics names?

I believe in musical excellence, and the sound of the Vienna Philharmonic, along with the Berlin Philharmonic, is of a quality above the rest of the orchestral world. First and foremost, I want to see this quality continue. If continuing this sound means that more women join the orchestra, I'll be the first to applaud. But it would be sad to see the orchestra forced to choose new women members, simply to please angry protesters like Mr. Lebrecht. Yet what else is Mr. Lebrecht hoping will come from his habitual whining?

In closing, I am a firm believer in fairness in the musical world. But part of fairness means abstaining from unwarranted criticism without substantive evidence. As things stand, Mr. Lebrecht is only spreading vitriol and slander that can be doing no good for the musical world. When he says that "Slipped Disc tries to see both sides of most stories", it's hard not to let out an exasperated sigh.

10 comments:

  1. Thank you very much for your post. Allow me to add my voice here. I was not given this chance by Mr.Lebrecht. As his long-time faithful reader I felt that I had certain rights to be a harsh critic. I felt that the blog took a turn for worse since recently. I can't judge if it is connected with chasing readership numbers. I just don't know. Two things in particular just peeve me - as a Russian-speaker (Latvian of Russian descent ) and as a female orchestra player. I don't enjoy at all Mr.Lebrecht engaging in russophobia.And I don't enjoy his intercession on my behalf. I won my chair because I was better than a dozen of men. Period. I want no condescension.
    I wrote, perhaps, a rather harsh comment and posted it to the blog. I was surprised to see it not approved for a while and then disappearing. I tried again. And again with a post scriptum asking why my comment is not appearing. I took a snap capture of a screen to prove that Mr. Lebrecht practices censorship. It's fine if he does but it should be disclosed. Here is a copy of what a wrote :
    "I have been reading Slipped Disc since good old times of ArtsJournal.  I am very sad to have been a witness to The Disc slipping into a morass of moralizing, Russophobia and sexism. Yes, sexism. Because how else are we to qualify Mr.Lebrecht lecturing us - and esteemed Vienna Philharmonic - on gender sensitivity before co-opting an unwilling reader into ogling posterior parts or an ample chest of another female musician with all the prisssiness of an old, old, sad man.
    Each time I open Slipped Disc page ( happens more or more rarely nowadays)  I can almost predict the daily talking points: bash VPO/New York Phil/name-your-own-orchestra; bash Netrebko/Gergiev/Name-your-own-Russian; bash female pianists, bash Lang Lang, bash IMG fraudster agency, what else did I forget? 
    I am hopeful those as disenchanted with this blog as I am will finally drive the point down. Please, come back to discussing music, there is no need in heaping tabloid dirt on top of art. It doesn't make music more popular or accessible but it sure ruins the enjoyment we derive from it.  I wish you best as I permanently delete this page from my favorites.
    Ps. Milka, save your poison for others. I won't be reading your replies."

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    Replies
    1. Thanks very much for your post. Norman blocked a female orchestral member from posting a rational post on his site? Oh, the irony!

      Delete
    2. Lebrecht's idiotic site has lost all credibility. He has locked-out everyone who dares to rebutt the trash he posts.

      There is no serious content left on Slipped Disc. Appalling libels are left on-sight whilst those who have been libelled get banned - for daring to reply.

      The worst of the bunch is "Milka" aka Catherine Fitzpatrick - a Russia-hating blogger who posts elsewhere as "La Russophobe" - a true revolting specimen of humanity.

      There's no point reading Slipped Disc any longer.

      I wonder if the VPO are aware that they are buying banner advertising on a site which trashes them on a daily basis??

      Delete
  2. I tried to comment several times on the exact same behalf and the same happend to me. Post was not published. I am starting to believe that far more people were silenced. And the number of people who dont like Lebrechts "Hetze" is a lot higher.

    The VPO cant just fire older members to hire women. Also some women are in maternity leave right now, should they come back illegally just for Mr. Lebrecht?

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  3. Please may I add my voice to Andrew Barnard's?

    Apart from being a vehicle for publicising all his other activities, Slipped Disc has been slowly disintegrating into a series of frequent personal rants by Mr. Norman Lebrecht. The site also frequently prints inaccurate statements, refusing to correct them, puts an inaccurate spin on stories by means of carefully chosen headlines, and often posts photos that one expects to find only in the gutter press.

    The use of the royal "We" emphasises that Mr. Lebrecht considers himself and his opinions to be above his readers. Since Mr Lebrecht presumably owns the site, he is entitled to write what he wants there; but, despite what he claims, to prejudge those who disagree with his point of view and to characterize them as pro-discrimination is not "trying to see both sides". His recent childish request that those who disagree with him leave his site is moreover discriminatory in itself.

    Much as I have often been drawn to comment myself on Slipped Disc (under my real name), I have decided never to do so again -- under any name! I have come to the sad conclusion that the average quality of the discussion engendered by Mr. Lebrecht is too low to be taken seriously and, clearly, comments with which he doesnt agree are censored. (I write as one who like the player above has also experienced this.) Even sensible and laudable comments are often effectively rendered invisible by the inane chatter and vicious remarks that appear above or below them.

    In addition to his attacks on Peter Gelb and New York's Metropolitan Opera, Valery Gergiev, et al, quite why Mr. Lebrecht is on a self-righteous one-man crusade to clean up the Viennese musical scene is not clear to me. If Don Quixote comes to mind, let us hope that his tilting at windmills has no effect. His pathetic attempt to get people to boycott the Vienna Philharmonic's New Year concert, on the grounds that a long time ago some of its members were Nazis, and that the orchestra does not have in place a quota system that guarantees a gender ratio of its players equal to that of the general population (or even, heaven forbid, that of music schools) is ill-conceived. Has he never heard of killing the goose that lays golden eggs?

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  4. Those who doubt that dissenting comments are censored from Slippedisc.com should compare the page there with this screenshot of it directly after I had posted earlier today: http://www.fugato.com/misc/slippedisc.jpg

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  5. Perhaps a dedicated page for those whose comments were deleted is in order?
    Yesterday I had the temerity to question question his outlandish response to the argument, verbatim: "Mr Lebrecht founded and owns this site. He has attracted 1.2 million monthly readers. Your view is very sad, indeed.") Both Alexa rankings and web traffic counter say otherwise. Not only this number is roughly 1/5th of his claim but the drop in readers' loyalty is starting indeed. http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/slippedisc.com
    http://www.trafficestimate.com/slippedisc.com
    This alone should have sounded an alarm bell, never mind a barrage of comments from dissatisfied readers.
    Need I say that my factual comment was not published?

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  6. Mr. Osbourne, too, is always citing the EC laws concerning discrimination, yet I wonder if he ever brought the VPO to "trial" if there'd be any evidence to substantiate his claim. Probably not. I don't understand the agenda here: Mr. lebrecht has posted some pretty sexist material on his site to say nothing of his disappointmentb(it seems) that Asians appear to win all the contests. I think the issue is with the VPO.

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  7. Thanks to all who posted. I have also had comments removed on Mr. Lebrecht's site. He seems to be unable to handle criticism. All of you are welcome at anytime to post on my blog, even if in disagreement. It's a pledge that I'm determined to keep, especially after seeing Mr. Lebrecht's discrimination against his critics.

    As others have pointed out, Mr. Lebrecht seems to be guilty of discrimination himself. It's just he wants to pick and choose who can and can't be the victim.

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  8. Dear Mr Barnard, I agree with your comments and observations on Slipped Disc. After all, Mr Lebrecht and some of the "erwünschte" commentators like William Osborne, to mention only the most extreme example, have established a rather totalitarian atmosphere on this once - long ago - informative blog. The problem is not the obvious censorship - I have seen all my posts removed over the last days, and I can only laugh at the obvious cowardness - , the real problem is the mixture of the poor journalistic quality of Mr Lebrecht and his informants (note the pluralis maiestatis "we" that is often being used) and their obsessive use of accusations, allegations and condemnations - often on non-musical matters, but intended to attack, discriminate, condemn, bash or ridicule individuals or institutions in the music business. One does not have to be a fierce defender of Vienna Phil, Gergiev, Chung or Gelb or any other addressee of his recent attacks to find this attitude alarming. Slipped Disc has become trashy and obsessive, and it shows the bitterness of its owner who has lost all credibility.

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