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Money is also a critical element, for the best orchestras have tended to be the richest. Boston's annual budget, for example, is $20 million, and Chicago's $16 million. "There isn't a one-to-one correlation between money and having a great orchestra," says Richard Bibler, president of the promising Milwaukee Symphony, which gets by on a budget of about $5 million a year, "but there is a gross correlation." Says Patricia Corbett, who, like her husband J. Ralph Corbett, is a prominent Cincinnati philanthropist: "An orchestra can be anything you want it to be if you are willing to pay the budget."
Others disagree with this notion, however, saying that tradition is equally important. "You can't simply buy a great orchestra," says Boston's Morris. "You have to build a tradition, and preserve it." Lukas Foss, Milwaukee's conductor, puts it bluntly: "Money makes you famous, not great."
While patrician orchestras such as Boston, Cleveland and Philadelphia, with their large subscriber lists and potent fund-raising capabilities, continue to operate without a financial loss, others are almost perennially troubled. The Buffalo Philharmonic, nearly $1 million in debt, scaled back its season last year from 48 to 40 weeks; the Detroit Symphony, suffering along with its city from the recession, has an accumulated deficit of nearly $2.7 million. Despite Rostropovich's name value, the National Symphony showed a $2.2 million loss last year.
Such economic disparity leads some to call for increased governmental support for the arts, to supplement the important financial contributions already being made by individuals, foundations and corporations. In the U.S., federal, state and local aid does not compare with artistic subsidies in most European countries. The separation of arts and state has had one beneficial side effect, though: because American orchestras are rarely very far from the brink, they are forced to make their product appeal to as wide an audience as possible. On the other hand, fiscal constraints often force conservatism in choice of repertory, with unfamiliar or contemporary music slighted so as not to offend those concertgoers principally attracted by the Beethoven symphonies.
No matter how accomplished orchestras become, there will always be differences of opinion among music lovers as to which is best. Once technical mastery is achieved, variations in sound and style become purely matters of taste. As conductors and personnel change, relative rankings will also change. Observes Solti: "Someone once said, 'To arrive at the top is difficult, but not impossible. To stay there is damned hard.' " But within the grouping at the top, the world-class orchestras can be counted on to show consistency and staying power, essential elements of their greatness. As the Cincinnati Symphony's general manager, Steven Monder, puts it, "I don't think an orchestra has a good concert or a good season or a good couple of seasons and all of a sudden it is one of the foremost orchestras in the world. It takes years and years of a strong tradition, of building and experience." —By Michael Walsh. Reported by Lee Griggs/Chicago and James Shepherd/London