Music 2
Bumped off
Peter Phillips
Rather to everyone's distress we have recently been coming face to face, or eye- ball to velvet upholstery, with a problem which habitually besets subscription con- cert societies: empty seats. It is not that the seats have not been sold, or, necessarily, that they could not have been sold: it is that they were sold in advance to people who did not show up on the night. The selling of season tickets for subscrip- tion concerts seems to be a good idea all round. The public benefits from having a choice of professionally planned events, with variety built into the sequence, a guar- anteed seat and usually some discount for committing themselves to the whole series. The organisers benefit from receiving a large amount of cash in advance of having to pay the artists and a feeling of relief that, whatever happens on the night, the enterprise has not been a total disaster. The trouble starts when the public at large takes it into its collective head to insist on gaining access to a hall which, although correctly said to be sold out, is half empty; or is technically sold out within a few hours of the advertisements appearing. It is also unfortunate, if not actually friction-
inducing, for artists who believe they deserve better than to have to play to blank rows.
From the point of view of the organisers such an embarrassment of supply might seem ideal, yet there is no doubt that to turn hundreds of people away from a sparsely attended hall gives a series a bad name. After the second of two concerts we were performing in Melbourne last month, I was bitterly complained at in the street by people who had heard that not every seat had been filled on the previous night, and yet were still being denied access. The staff at the ticket office confirmed that they had been subjected to a stream of complaint and abuse from customers, who said they had been unfairly treated and promised to lobby the performers, as I had been lob- bied, to try to convince them to return under different management since the cur- rent one was 'elitist'. The point about the subscription ticket-holders was clearly lost on them. They took their non-admission as a slap in the face, in the style of the greet- ing one used to receive in Eastern Euro- pean restaurants in the bad old days. One would walk into those cavernous halls ask- ing for a table for two, to be met by a wait- er would look at the way your trousers hung, look round the empty room and declare he couldn't accommodate you. I'd love to know what line the Gradski Podrum in Zagreb takes with its customers now.
Part of the problem is that it is illegal to sell a seat twice; and even if it were not, one can imagine how annoying it would be to turn up to a concert a few minutes late, through no fault of one's own, to find that a time penalty had been incurred and the seat resold. Since this would be patently unfair, it is hard to see what steps the organisers can take whilst still encouraging their patrons to pay up in advance for a whole series. Of course ticket-holders are encouraged to ring in if they do not intend to use their seats, but many don't bother on the grounds that they feel they own the seat for the night and can leave it empty if they want to. I have met hall managers who are prepared to let members of the public take vacant seats at a flat rate after the first piece has been played, on the understand- ing that they must move if the original ticket-holder shows up; but the cake is hardly worth the candle. Further than this it is effectively impossible to go: anyone who can think of a way round this impasse will do audience and performers alike a very good turn.
One thing I don't understand is why it is illegal to sell concert seats twice and seem- ingly not quite so illegal to sell aeroplane seats twice. Anyone who travels as con- stantly as musicians do will have a list of tedious stories to illustrate this anomaly. Maybe concert-planners are too polite: despite the competition we endlessly hear about, all the leading airlines regularly bump customers off flights with no warn- ing, and live to tell the tale.
Previous page
