Orchestral dissent

Imagine that you can’t get into a class because it has a limited enrollment. Now imagine that the professor has reserved seats in the class for students from another school because he thinks those students are more qualified. What if native Italians fill Italian classes? This is what happens in Music V1592: University Orchestra. Students from the Juilliard School and Manhattan School of Music fill the Columbia Orchestra’s brass and percussion sections, even though Columbia students audition for the same positions. The orchestra is a two-credit class in the music department taught by maestro Jeffrey Milarsky. Spots that could go to Columbia students are offered instead to students from the world’s most prestigious music schools. This practice should end for many reasons. It is fraudulent, dishonest, and at odds with the spirit of an educational place. To be forthright, I played in this orchestra my first and second years. This is not a personal vendetta. But on behalf of those students who never had the privilege, such a vendetta would be perfectly reasonable.  The practice defrauds the Columbia student body by transferring the right of enrolled students to take a class to students who have no affiliation with the school. Quite simply, Columbia students are not getting what they pay for.  

It is dishonest because the name “Columbia University Orchestra” misrepresents the players in the orchestra. This misrepresentation brings into question the achievements of the orchestra. Can we join Dr. Milarsky in praising the orchestra’s “technical skill” if so many of his players are on a track to performing with the world’s greatest ensembles? Would we give such praise to the Columbia baseball team if it hired out the Yankees? In turn, the policy hurts Columbia students who play in the orchestra—to say nothing of those who miss out entirely—because listeners cannot genuinely appreciate their contribution. A greater sense of integrity is at stake for Columbia. Any university must refuse credit for what it does not accomplish just as quickly as it honors its own achievements. If someone brings praise to a school by exploiting the merits of those with no connection to the school, this disingenuousness will cast doubt on every activity conducted under university auspices. The same principle grounds every school’s interest in academic integrity, which is why we might consider the name “Columbia University Orchestra” an act of institutional plagiarism. Just as a plagiarizing author pretends the work of another is his own, the “Columbia University” Orchestra disguises the skill of Juilliard students as that of Columbia students.

But then, maybe Columbia players aren’t good enough. Maybe we need Juilliard players to meet the orchestra’s goal of playing the hardest music. Most undergraduate orchestras draw from only their student body while managing repertoire that is just as challenging. Brown performed Stravinsky’s “Rite of Spring,” which many consider more challenging than the same composer’s “Firebird Suite,” which Columbia will play in a few weeks. But the point would hold even if a truly Columbian student orchestra could not play virtuosic pieces. The orchestra is a credited class and the standard of competing with semi-professionals does not apply in any other class. What kind of school offers a class that its own students cannot take?  

It makes sense for Juilliard players to pursue the highest level of practical musicianship—this is how they will make their living—but what good is holding liberal arts students to that standard if it means denying many of them a chance to play altogether? How does it serve the orchestra’s “principal mission” of “giving students the opportunity to perform?” Dr. Milarsky himself claimed to like the “stress-free” and “less competitive” feel that comes from working with Columbia students, who, as he put it to Spectator, “do not have a career dependent upon their musical endeavors.” Nevertheless, he gives preference to players whose careers are precisely “dependent upon their musical endeavors.”  

The solution here is the common sense of education. Let Columbia students who enroll take the course as space permits. If we cannot play like professionals, help us play our best. The issue turns on a core premise of teaching: Educational and professional matters divide precisely between an impulse to help or ignore those who are imperfect. In a global metropolis where world-class versions of almost every human endeavor can be found just a few blocks away, we need to be especially vigilant about this division. Does Columbia know what side it is on? 

The author is a Columbia College junior majoring in history.

Tags: Opinion, Aaron Liskov, Aaron Liskov, Columbia University Orchestra, Juilliard, spread