Leaving Tanglewood, and wondering what's next. BSO board, leadership and musicians in deep conflict

A rented storefront in Stockbridge demonstrates the voice of the people: Reinstate Andris Nelsons. The fired BSO music director, whose contract doesn’t terminate until Aug. 2027, finds himself the center of a citizen uprising. Jacquelyn Ball photograph

Lucky me. I can concentrate on the music and try to ignore everything else.

The Boston Symphony Orchestra isn’t so lucky, because at Tanglewood this summer nobody can ignore what’s happening with orchestra management.

Music director Andris Nelsons was fired in March. He occupies lame-duck status for another year, and he finds himself the focus of a seemingly lost cause—getting his job back. Only CEO Chad Smith and some board members seem to think it was right decision not to renew his contract (add in one New York Times reporter): the BSO musicians, the audience, most of the staff and some of the board are mortified. Management explanations for the decision have been toothless corporate-speak. 

Since the announcement, Nelsons’s concerts at Symphony Hall and at Tanglewood aren’t just ending in ovations—they end in histrionic shouting, with stomping demonstrations of support. All the musicians wear red carnations of solidarity with Nelsons, as do many in the audience (BSO management is trying to ban their distribution). Posters demanding his reinstatement dot the Berkshires. Want more turmoil? The musicians’s contract expires next month. 

That’s lucky me. Like everyone else reviewing, I’ll have to include a summary of this business nonsense in every review for the next year. But that’s it for me; I’m not working for a daily paper anymore, and I don’t have to have to detail in print any of those gut-wrenching conversations with people who might have made mistakes, but can’t admit it. I’ll stick to the rep.

Except for the awkward. I’m certain many of the BSO staff feel discouraged, and many of them are paralyzed into silence. That hurts, frankly; I’ve know several of them professionally for years. Notable arts administrators are leaving the BSO, and a sort of fear—of speaking to journalists certainly, but of the uncertainty as well—permeates the Tanglewood campus.

Back to me: I’m leaving Tanglewood for the season tomorrow, wishing I could wrap up some additional insights into a couple weeks here and head off (I wrote about the Festival of Contemporary Music for CVNA, but not the BSO performances). But the Nelson firing story will persist; we all wish it had a better plot. 

One thought from last night, wandering away from the Shed after Figaro, with yelling and stomping in the background: if BSO management thinks this will blow over by next year, nope. Tanglewood has personal significance for many people, and if change happens, it better be explained coherently. Next summer, without any such coherent explanation, the stomping and cheering will be louder and longer.

The presence of composer/conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen at Tanglewood this summer—he conducted several Shed programs for the BSO, and guest curated the Festival of Contemporary Music—leads to unsupported speculation about him replacing Nelsons. Salonen and BSO CEO Chad Smith worked together at the Los Angeles Philharmonic, during dynamic growth years when Disney Hall was built and that orchestra blossomed. 

Esa-Pekka Salonen’s presence at Tanglewood was musically focused and professsional—ignoring the circulating turmoil on campus. Benjamin Ealovega photograph

But Salonen’s participation was clearly years in the organizing; intersections in the music world happen all the time. I don’t know Salonen, but I’ll wager he hates his unexpected part in all this. (If so, it didn’t show: FCM was terrific, as were the Shed programs that he conducted.)

Says here it’s unlikely to be Salonen. Who would come to the BSO right now, when management and the board obviously can’t articulate an adult reason for all of this turmoil? This was one salient point in David Allen’s recent New York Times opinion piece: who would get involved—talking about donors, musicians, board—in a behemoth non-profit like the BSO with leadership like this? 

Atlanta, Rockport, Tanglewood, Menlo, Tanglewood again, and more to come. It’s been a great summer, writing about music in sweet places. Lucky me. I wish I felt better about it.