Professional singers in the Jalisco State Choir (Coro del Estado de Jalisco) say they are reeling from a sharp downturn in their working conditions and, since January, the loss of a third of their 41 singers, who have been pressured to leave or quit due to discouragement.
“You don’t know if you’ll have a job tomorrow,” said one singer with decades in the choir, which is based in Guadalajara. “Everyone was excited when we did ‘Madame Butterfly’ in November, but since then our contracts have been cut to a month. They used to be for a year. We got really upset when we read in the paper they don’t want to give us contracts at all. They want to pay us by event. There will be no more esprit de corps.”
The choir was founded in 1981 as an economical alternative to hiring a qualified choir from Mexico City every time an opera was produced in this city of extreme opera fans.
But salaries for the choir have never been as good as for the Jalisco Philharmonic Orchestra. Although both are run by the state Secretary of Culture (Secretaria de Cultura), Philharmonic musicians earn about twice what Choir singers do (about 15,000 pesos a month vs. 8,000) and enjoy much better benefits. Similarly, several professional choirs in Mexico City and Xalapa offer singers about 15,000 pesos a month.
“We used to have medical benefits, but those were cancelled a long time ago,” said the singer, who asked not to be named due to the delicacy of the situation and because state-employed musicians have suffered reprisals for speaking to lawyers, the press and unions.
“We used to have standard vacation arrangements at Christmas and Easter,” the musician added. “But in the first two weeks in January, they didn’t pay us at all and after that several payments were two, three or four weeks late! Because of all this, we finally joined a union. But we don’t know if that will help.”
In June, at the same time as a flurry of artists from the Philharmonic and other state musical groups were airing similar problems, choir musicians went as a group to the state Congress and governor’s office, carrying written pleas and petitions. In the background loomed the deliberations of state bodies that have been questioning the Secretary of Culture about controversies such as the purchase of a very expensive painting for the Instituto Cultural Cabañas, musicians’ complaints before a Human Rights committee and the notion of treating the choir not as an institution but as individual contractors.
“We are here due to the fear of being fired,” the singers announced at the government offices, noting that some singers had already left and the Secretary of Culture had said they would not be replaced.
“We’ve been told they want to make us into a chamber choir with as few as 16 people,” said Manuel Beltran, a baritone originally from Mexico City who has sung with the choir since 1990.
“But that’s impossible. Our main purpose has always been to help with operas and concerts. With so few singers we couldn’t cover that type of sound. Even now, when we are down to 28 singers, our daily practice sessions are uncomfortable. The altos and basses are very incomplete.”
“You need a full group for operas and symphonies,” agreed another choir singer.
“And they must be experienced. Experienced people have probably sung these operas or symphonies before. Even so, the group practices every day for months or even a year before an opera. You can’t pull in music students a few weeks before, which is what the Secretary of Culture is suggesting. You can’t easily find singers capable of opera choruses and if the capable ones leave the Choir, they’ll get other jobs and won’t be available. What are they thinking at the Secretary of Culture? There are 350 bureaucrats there and they want to get rid of 25 good singers?”
“Some in high positions at the Secretary of Culture aren’t qualified for their jobs. They don’t know much about music,” said a knowledgeable observer from outside Guadalajara who is familiar with the local situation.
One of the singers, who recently left the choir due to job insecurity and plans to start a restaurant, practically sobbed, “It’s breaking my heart. I’ll die if I don’t sing.”
“It’s the job I love. It’s my profession,” said Beltran, noting that the choir is set to sing at the Cervantino festival in Guanajuato in October and perform Verdi’s opera “Othello” in the fall.
“But as for next year, who knows? But we are resisting. We are trying to do our best. ”