Yesterday I caught an article that I can no longer find so I won’t cite one (there are plenty of others corroborating the facts out there) on the ongoing labor dispute at the Metropolitan Opera.  It’s quite messy – there are at least 15 different unions at work in the 300 million dollar organization, including the only stage hands union – local number 1 – anyone seems to know about.  We’ll see what the federal mediators and an independent financial analyst manage to figure out for the Met (power to the people!), but in the meantime that got me thinking about musician pay at major symphonies.

It didn’t take long to find this list in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune.  I’ll just show the top five but theirs goes quite a bit further.  The list only includes US orchestras.

1. Chicago Symphony Orchestra – $144,040

2. Los Angeles Philharmonic  – $143,260

3. San Francisco Symphony – $141,700

4. New York Philharmonic – $134,940

5. Boston Symphony – $132,028

So the best musicians in the country – excluding touring virtuosos – make about what your average lawyer does.  I can’t help but be happy that the hometown crew comes out on top.

Thanks for reading.

Ryan