The God of Conducting Starting from Absolute Pitch

Chapter 343 Loan Performance? Baden-Baden Festival!

Everything was just as Wu Jianhai told Chen Qiu.

With the release of Musician Magazine’s annual results, many orchestras have begun to make further adjustments during the Chinese New Year period.

Some symphony orchestras dismissed some of their old members, asking them to go to other orchestras or transfer to logistics departments, and no longer be responsible for performances.

Some other symphony orchestras also recruit some new people into the orchestra and adjust the personnel structure of the orchestra to ensure that the orchestra's development can be healthier.

The old lead the new, the new become the old, and then lead the new.

If this cycle continues, the orchestra will inevitably become stronger and stronger.

Of course, this is only true for some weaker bands.

They do not have enough funds to squander. Unlike those big Internet companies, they do not need to worry about training new employees. They can directly find people who can adapt to the company from the market, and those who cannot adapt will be eliminated directly.

They could only pin their hopes on finding a talented musician, training him and enabling him to fit in with the orchestra.

However, many symphony orchestras have a very high staff turnover, and this type of training will more likely result in working for those large orchestras.

The big bands are getting richer and richer, and the people they find are getting stronger and stronger.

Small bands are getting poorer and poorer. They can barely train a few new people but are still sucked dry by the big bands.

If it weren't for the fact that the group of people under Chen Qiu had the same goal as Chen Qiu, which was to build a top-notch symphony orchestra from scratch.

Otherwise, the people from the Harmony Symphony Orchestra would have been poached long ago.

However, even so, during the orchestra transfer window after the New Year, two or three people from the Harmony Symphony Orchestra could not bear the invitations from those big orchestras and submitted their resignations to Chen Qiu.

Chen Qiu asked them at the time to find out which symphony orchestra they were going to.

The result was unexpected.

The symphony orchestra they went to was not actually nearby.

One of them was poached by someone from the Guicheng Symphony Orchestra.

The other person transferred directly to the Hangzhou Philharmonic Orchestra.

This is actually very easy to understand.

These two symphony orchestras are among the highest-paying symphony orchestras in China.

Basically, it can be regarded as a BTA-level Internet giant.

The first is the Guicheng Symphony Orchestra, which is currently the most rapidly developing symphony orchestra besides the Harmony Symphony Orchestra.

They are in line with international standards.

In just over a decade, it has reached the top five in the country.

With tens of millions of dollars invested every year, without considering the return on investment, the symphony orchestra has gained fame both domestically and abroad.

Although the concert hall where they are stationed is not the best in the country, it is also one of the better ones.

The same is basically true for the Hangzhou Philharmonic next door.

The strength of the Hangzhou Philharmonic Orchestra is much stronger than that of the Haicheng Philharmonic Orchestra.

The Haicheng Philharmonic is ranked in the top 20 in the country, while the Hangzhou Philharmonic is ranked around the top five.

The only drawback of this symphony orchestra is that the quality of their own concert hall is not good enough.

The concert hall held their orchestra back.

It is obvious that this symphony orchestra sounds better when performing outside than in its own concert hall.

Therefore, many people are considering whether to replace the Hangzhou Philharmonic Orchestra with a new concert hall so that the Hangzhou Philharmonic Orchestra can compete for the top three position in the country.

However, because the investment in building a new concert hall is too huge, the estimate alone is that it will cost tens of billions or even hundreds of billions, so it has been shelved.

After learning that these two people were invited by the two symphony orchestras, Chen Qiu no longer felt much dissatisfaction.

Compared to being poached by those unknown small orchestras at huge prices, being able to enter these two top symphony orchestras as normal musicians will be of great help to their future career development.

Moreover, the fact that he was chosen by these two symphony orchestras is enough to show Chen Qiu's vision.

Chen Qiu quickly agreed to the two people's application to withdraw from the band, helped them properly handle the orchestra's affairs, and sent them off.

After the two people were missing, the number of people in the orchestra changed from 33 + 1 (Li Miaomiao) to 31 + 1.

The 31-member symphony orchestra is considered a good symphony orchestra in China, but if it is placed in Germany, it becomes a D-level symphony orchestra, which is the lowest level symphony orchestra.

Chen Qiu and Wu Jianhai discussed the band's overseas expansion for a long time, and then discovered a very embarrassing problem.

Level D symphony orchestra is the lowest score for an orchestra. Unless you are a chamber orchestra that only plays chamber music, you will not be eligible to be invited.

If you want to enter the summer music festivals, you need at least C level.

It sounds a bit discriminatory.

Why is it that a symphony orchestra ranked 33rd in the country and with a world orchestra rating of 9.1 points is not qualified to be a C-level orchestra, but instead is a D-level orchestra, which is not up to standard and is the lowest level?
Actually not so.

The level of the German orchestra has little to do with its strength, but is more related to the number of people.

In 2009, after long collective negotiations with orchestras, the German Symphony Orchestra Association promulgated a new grading system for symphony orchestras, which is roughly divided into four levels from A to D according to the size of the orchestra.

56人以下的乐团被归为D类，56-65人为C类，66-99人为B类，99人以上为A类。

Class AB is further subdivided.

其中B类中78人以上的乐团为B/1类，99-129人的A类乐团为A/2类，超过130人的为A/1。

The salaries of these orchestras need to be linked to the level of the orchestra.

In other words, the more people there are in a symphony orchestra, the higher the salary they need to pay.

This means that in addition to representing the number of people and salaries, symphony orchestras of those levels also vaguely represent their strength.

After all... you must be strong enough to support the members of the symphony orchestra and allow the orchestra to develop healthily. You cannot just go for the numbers for the sake of numbers.

Otherwise, if you just find 130 people, don't pay them, and set up an entertainment-type symphony orchestra, wouldn't that be a waste of time?

The Germans will naturally not let you take advantage of such an obvious loophole.

Therefore, the A-level symphony orchestra in Germany basically represents the strongest musical strength in Germany.

Now Su Yue is studying in Germany.

If Chen Qiu wants to lead the orchestra to catch up with Su Yue, he must lead the orchestra to Germany.

He also saw that Su Yue's current global ranking has reached 100th.

If we only reach Europe, then there is no point at all.

I couldn't even raise my head in front of Su Yue.

In order to show enough strength in front of Su Yue.

Chen Qiu must lead his team to attack Germany!
To this end, Chen Qiu quickly selected a group of people from Haicheng Conservatory of Music to serve as interns in the orchestra.

For example, Zhang Yu, Song Ge and their group, as well as some former members of the Harmony Symphony Orchestra who have already graduated.

After the number of members of the orchestra was restored to 56, they stopped recruiting further.

Chen Qiu has also thought about recruiting people from society.

But there is a problem with recruiting people in society.

It is easy to recruit those experienced and powerful people.

Chen Qiu has very high requirements for the orchestra. They need to perform three completely different sets of works every week.

Although their repertoire has increased recently, they have been looping the works, playing some of the works they have played before, and arranging and combining the works.

But even so, they still rehearse and perform two new works every week.

This intensity made Chen Qiu not have much expectation for Lao Youtiao.

Even though his mailbox was filled with countless job applications, Chen Qiu did not choose to select from them.

After Chen Qiu and his band went through several days of admission review, everyone was finally able to take a break.

In order to make the development of the orchestra smoother and the band members more harmonious.

Chen Qiu did not interfere too much in the orchestra's recruitment, but let the musicians choose who to become a member of the orchestra.

Just like the Berlin Philharmonic.

Only if more than two-thirds of the musicians agree that this person can join the orchestra, can he enter Chen Qiu's presence, so that Chen Qiu can get to know him better and think about how to adjust his fit with the orchestra. Everything is proceeding in an orderly manner.

only……

After the orchestra had been rehearsing and performing with a few new members, within less than a day, more than a dozen people submitted their resignation applications to Chen Qiu and the orchestra.

There was no way, they had no way of adapting to the intensity of the orchestra.

Especially since they still have to rehearse while attending school there.

The amount of rehearsal on the first day almost caused them to die suddenly in school.

The remaining dozen or so people could only hold on and perform with the orchestra.

Although they managed to persevere, their self-esteem was severely damaged.

They never thought that anyone could rehearse like this.

And not just one or two.

They quickly suppressed their inner joy.

No longer proud of his success in entering the Harmony Symphony Orchestra.

They now have only one thought in their minds, which is to keep up with the pace of the orchestra and try not to fall behind.

Such great pressure made many people feel depressed.

But I am still trying hard to keep up with the team.

Seeing how hard this group of people were working, everyone in the orchestra couldn't help but smile knowingly.

They thought back to last year when they had just formed the Harmony Symphony Orchestra.

They seemed to be trying hard to follow the orchestra's pace, just like they are now.

Same effort, same hard work.

For a moment, everyone became more friendly towards this group of newcomers, and from time to time reminded them of some of the points that Chen Qiu might emphasize.

Because some people left the band, Chen Qiu recruited several more people. It took several rounds to barely increase the number of members in the band to 56.

After confirming that the number of members in the orchestra was correct, Chen Qiu contacted Wu Jianhai and submitted their information to the music festival in Europe.

Not long after, news came from the European Music Festival.

First of all, some of the larger music festivals expressed regret that they were unable to give the Harmony Symphony Orchestra an invitation to perform.

The orchestras that large music festivals hope to accommodate should preferably be A-level symphony orchestras, and at worst they need to have a B1-level symphony orchestra, which means more than 99 people.

Chen Qiu hadn't thought too much about these large-scale music festivals. Since they didn't want him, then forget it.

The orchestra has already developed to its limit in terms of number of members. Unless they ignore the quality of the orchestra and recruit a large number of people who are not suitable for the orchestra, they will have no way to continue recruiting new members.

Therefore, Chen Qiu and Wu Jianhai focused their attention on other small and medium-sized music festivals.

Of course, it doesn’t mean that these small and medium-sized music festivals are bad, it’s just that they are smaller in scale.

But the gold content will not change at all.

After Chen Qiu contacted them, several music festivals responded to Chen Qiu soon.

First up is the Rheingau Music Festival.

This festival is one of the most important music festivals in Germany, with nearly 140 performances every summer.

The performance was held in a monastery rather than a separate concert hall.

If Chen Qiu remembered correctly, this monastery was in Hesse. There was no special train going there directly, but it could be reached by bus or only two or three public buses.

Of course, most people choose to drive themselves rather than take public transportation to get there.

Therefore, after seeing the news about this music festival, Chen Qiu put it on hold for the time being and had no intention of agreeing to it directly.

Another piece of news that surprised Chen Qiu was...

The Baden-Baden Festival invited them.

The Baden-Baden Music Festival may not sound very famous, but Chen Qiu is very familiar with this festival.

Because this festival is the home of the Berlin Philharmonic.

Chen Qiu has a very clear idea of ​​where they will perform.

The Baden-Baden Festival Theatre is the largest concert hall in Germany.

They have enough space for 2500 people.

It is the second largest concert hall in Europe after the Opera Bastille.

Therefore this place became the new favorite of the Berlin Philharmonic.

They even gave up the Salzburg Festival for this place.

Chen Qiu remembers that he felt very comfortable every time he came to Baden-Baden to perform with the Berlin Philharmonic.

After all, in addition to its beautiful environment, this place also has extremely rich hot spring resources.

After the performance, everyone often makes an appointment to go to the large public bath to soak in the hot springs and relax their bodies.

You can even go hiking in the Black Forest next door.

In addition to the invitations from these two music festivals, they were also invited by some other smaller, less well-known music festivals.

After considering the band's schedule, Chen Qiu thought for a moment and decided on the band's goal.

The first thing to do is definitely to accept the invitation from Baden-Baden and go to the Baden-Baden Music Festival to compete on the same stage with the Berlin Philharmonic.

Well, although the Berlin Philharmonic may look down on them, it is difficult for them to defeat the Berlin Philharmonic and win the most popular award in this kind of music festival.

But the momentum is still necessary.

If he can’t win the Best Player of the Year award, can he still win the Best Newcomer award?

Chen Qiu quickly set his goal on winning the Best Newcomer award in Baden-Baden.

Apart from the performance in Baden-Baden, there doesn't seem to be any conflict in the schedule for the Rheingau, so if the orchestra rents two buses, there doesn't seem to be any problem.

After confirming these two key points, Chen Qiu was still a little hesitant as to whether to check out performances in other places.

After all, flying to Europe just to perform in one or two places and then coming back seems a bit too monotonous, right?
But if the performance is only for about 10 days, then it’s just right?

Chen Qiu fell into hesitation.

However, Chen Qiu's hesitation was quickly dispelled after he heard about the orchestra's financial situation.

The band has not yet found a suitable financial sponsor.

They didn't have enough money to take so many people on a tour around Europe.

Air tickets to Europe during the Easter period are very expensive, perhaps around 7k per person for a round trip.

Then according to the accommodation standards in Europe, assuming 50 euros per person, which is 400 yuan, accommodation for 10 days and 9 nights alone may cost more than 3 yuan, almost 6 yuan.

There are also expenses for meals, travel, and some sightseeing.

We can’t let the group members pay for these themselves, right?
Then Chen Qiu would really become a black-hearted businessman.

Adding up all the expenses, the orchestra needs to prepare at least one million, which is enough for so many people in the orchestra to go to Europe.

Chen Qiu gritted his teeth as he looked at his family's savings which were gradually running out.

If the band can gain fame in Europe, it will surely have better development.

So, it’s not impossible to borrow money to perform.

Although it hurts a bit...

However, based on the band's current cash flow, if it's one million, they can pay it back in about a year.

From a certain perspective, it's not a big loss.

Chen Qiu couldn't help but grit his teeth.

However, just when Chen Qiu decided to go to the bank for a loan to take the orchestra abroad for performances, the Haicheng Opera House came knocking on the door.

(End of this chapter)