🔒Next act: With contract negotiations looming, Hartford Symphony Orchestra aims to diversify performances, audience

The Hartford Symphony Orchestra is aiming to rebound from the pandemic — which forced the group to shut down for 18 months — by tapping into a broader audience with more diverse performances and performers.

The move aims to expand HSO’s customer base as it is still trying to recover pre-pandemic ticket sales. It also comes as HSO is in the midst of new contract talks with its 86 unionized performers.

This represents the second time HSO management has been in labor talks since tumultuous negotiations in 2015, which led to threats of the symphony shutting down amid financial difficulties. HSO’s unionized performers eventually made concessions — including taking a significant pay cut — to get a deal done.

The current contract expires Aug. 31, officials said.

HSO President and CEO Steve Collins said his organization is in the middle of a full-fledged effort to bring more diversity to the Hartford Symphony moving forward — a trend happening at many arts organizations in Greater Hartford and around the country.

Collins said he’s heard from musicians, patrons, peers and others that the symphony, which in some cases offered performances that were seen by primarily white and older patrons, needs to diversify.

“You’ve seen a lot of it this season, but especially next season you will see a great number of racially-diverse composers and guest artists,” said the 54-year-old CEO, who noted that renowned Black composer and conductor Quinn Mason will join the HSO for four weeks beginning in October. “We are also in the process of figuring out a program for young diverse professional musicians to perform with the orchestra within the ensemble.”

In-person return

In addition to diversifying its audience, HSO is also trying to recapture its pre-pandemic customer base.

While the HSO has reported a surplus for five consecutive years with a budget that stands at about $5.5 million, ticket sales are down about 20% in fiscal year 2022 compared to 2021, Collins said.

The drop-off is due to theatergoers’ attitudes, fears and apprehensiveness about COVID, Collins said.

“There is a certain percentage of concert-goers who, for whatever reason, are not comfortable returning to these types of venues. COVID is the biggest reason,” Collins said. “We need to remind them that there are some great things happening here. We need to get the word out to those people, many of whom have not seen a concert in two- or two-and-a-half years. It will take a strong marketing campaign.”

HSO performances — most of which take place at The Bushnell in Hartford under the leadership of musical director Carolyn Kuan — are broken into a number of different series. For example, the masterwork series is a mix of golden oldies and creative and innovative new works that runs from October through June.

The POPS! series typically combines holiday shows and movies. As an example, the symphony in April performed music from “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire,” as the audience watched the movie live.

There are also smaller ensembles like the Sunday serenades and Talcott Mountain Music Festival, with five performances in July in Simsbury.

Collins said HSO is projecting a surplus for a sixth year in a row. It held up financially during the pandemic thanks to $2.2 million in federal and state aid programs.

In an effort to reach new audiences, the symphony last month held its first-ever free concert in Bushnell Park, which attracted more than 1,000 people, 70% of whom had never previously been to a concert.

The crowd was also more racially diverse.

“We need to make sure we are opening the doors of the HSO to the widest audience possible and that means offering different kinds of concerts for different audience segments,” Collins said. “That means opening for a wider diversity of concert-goers, both racially and socio-economically.”

New contract negotiations

As HSO’s CEO, Collins wears many hats. He interacts with the musicians, The Bushnell and a 30-member board of directors, among other constituents.

It’s a juggling act that Bob Bausmith, HSO board chairperson-elect, said Collins has mastered.

“I don’t know how the orchestra can function without Steve Collins,” said Bausmith, who is the founder and CEO of West Hartford business consulting firm Accelerate Innovation. “There are a lot of moving parts when trying to manage an orchestra like this. He has this ability to navigate through some of the many difficult challenges.”

One of the most important roles Collins, and his board, will play in the weeks ahead is negotiator. That’s because HSO’s contract with its unionized musicians is set to expire at the end of next month.

Orchestra members are represented by the Connecticut Valley Federation of Musicians, Local 400 of the American Federation of Musicians.

The HSO has had past challenging negotiations with its union, most notably in 2015 when both sides reached an impasse on a new contract and the National Labor Relations Board accused HSO’s management of failing to bargain in good faith.

There was even talk of the HSO — which was reportedly running a more than $1.3 million deficit at the time — shutting down amid financial difficulties.

An agreement was eventually reached in January 2016, with musicians agreeing to a 36% cut in salary and benefits over four seasons. Another less headline-grabbing contract negotiation took place in 2019, officials said.

Joseph Messina, president of the union that employs the HSO musicians, said relations between the union and management “are as cordial as they can be.”

Messina said union members took “quite a big hit” in the 2015 contract negotiations and they want to get back to where they were before those concessions.

“We need to make a good start in getting those concessions back, although we realize we might not be able to do it all in one swoop,” he said.

A key sticking point in previous negotiations has been the amount of work guaranteed in the contract, and that remains an issue, said Messina.

“We’d like to make sure the musicians are part of any growth that the symphony can enjoy,” Messina said. “We will do our best to make sure that we have management understand that it’s necessary for the musicians to share in the growth in order to maintain top-quality musicians.”

Collins – who is one of 14 non-musicians employed at the HSO – said he expects labor negotiations to be more cordial this time around.

“We are coming out of an incredibly stressful period and a difficult period for everyone,” Collins said. “As we are in the process of a new collective bargaining agreement, I am confident we can work together to create an agreement. But, you have to compromise and have some collaboration and mutual problem solving. I’m confident that through our concerted efforts that we will get there and come out of this with an agreement everyone can live with.”