These are what the Chinese would call ‘interesting’ times – as in the curse ‘may you live in interesting times’ – for orchestras and their musicians. As if coordinated by an invisible hand – cough, wink, nudge – a series of boards and their managements have made the decision that their problems are solely due to the unnecessarily high cost of their labor force – the musicians. Unlike a company that, say, makes cars, the people in an orchestra are the product. Without them, there is no music. The conductor can show up, but he won’t make much of a sound with his arms unless he flaps them really hard. And, like the NFL referees, experience matters. An orchestra full of just out of conservatory graduates would sound pretty good, but orchestras are artistic organisms that take generations to build and perfect. The experience and grounding of the senior players mixes with the youth and virtuosity (which the veteran players also possess, believe me!) and results in a sort of group-think alchemy that is extremely hard to describe, but is an undeniable part of what makes an ensemble great.