August 28, 2014 by Howard Pousner
Two years after rancorous contract negotiations, a lockout and a narrowly averted postponement of the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra’s season, ASO management and its musicians face a Sept. 6 deadline to strike a new collective bargaining agreement.
Both sides are holding their cards close, saying they don’t want to negotiate in public, in hopes of forging a new deal that would allow the 70th anniversary season to open as scheduled on Sept. 25. But there are clear indications that management is seeking further concessions from the players, who claimed when the two-year agreement was announced in September 2012 that the cuts they reluctantly conceded to would set the orchestra back for years.
Both sides are holding their cards close, saying they don’t want to negotiate in public, in hopes of forging a new deal that would allow the 70th anniversary season to open as scheduled on Sept. 25. But there are clear indications that management is seeking further concessions from the players, who claimed when the two-year agreement was announced in September 2012 that the cuts they reluctantly conceded to would set the orchestra back for years.