Klarinet Archive - Posting 000065.txt from 2005/09

From: "Bryan Crumpler" <crumpletox@-----.com>
Subj: [kl] RE: Coast Guard Band
Date: Thu, 08 Sep 2005 09:32:43 -0400

>All persons entering the Coast Guard Band are enlisted at the pay
>grade of E-6, as Musician (Petty Officer) First Class. Starting
>salary between $37,128 and $41,760; full military benefits, 30 days
>annual vacation and pension plan.

Wow... this really boggles my mind... so I'm going to throw out a few
questions from the peanut gallery....

How is it that these military band jobs can always pay decent salaries with
benefits with guaranteed contracts for 4+ years and vacation plus
retirement... whereas most orchestras these days (supposedly jobs that are
the see all be all for musicians) can barely pay more than 4 or 5 thousand a
year in services which aren't guaranteed, have no tenure and no contract
terms beyond 1 year... like 98% of the openings on musical chairs right now?

Do military bands have _that_ big an audience or does the gov't think many
people would be turned off by the fact that it is a military group, and
therefore are offering these benefits to be competitive? I mean, right now
this is the best clarinet job on the market for anyone under 35.

If you can't be gay and enlisted in the military in the US, can you be gay
in a US military band? Haha! I'm not knockin' gay people... just wondering.

And why on earth do they always have a long list of orchestral excerpts with
the Mozart Concerto as a required solo for a band audition? Shouldn't they
be pulling excerpts from Lord of the Rings or Armenian Dances or Sonoran
Desert Holiday, with a concerto solo written for concert band accompaniment
or something???? I mean... how often are you going to use an
A-clarinet....... in Band? Haha

The peanuts have spoken.

Bryan
http://www.whosthatguy.com
-------------------------------------------------
My new CD Release MONOCHROME is now available for purchase at:
www.whosthatguy.com
-------------------------------------------------

-------------------------------------------------------------------
Klarinet is a service of Woodwind.Org, Inc. http://www.woodwind.org