Friedrich --

Robert H. Hughes in The Wall Street Journal (online, but you have to subscribe) reports that big-city symphony orchestras are undergoing a terrible financial crisis. They're really feeling the current business crunch. "Nearly a dozen cities' symphonies are operating six figures or more in the red," Hughes writes. Programming and salaries have been cut, seasons have been shortened, and a few orchestras have closed up shop. All this, despite the fact that attendance grew 16% during the 1990s.

Further interesting facts: income from ticket sales accounts for only 38% of the revenues of the big orchestras. (Other main sources of income: endowments, gifts, government funding.) Classical-CD sales are shrinking. And the number of commercial radio stations devoted to classical has shrunk from 50 to 32 in the last decade.

Best,

Michael