by Roy Brewer
or the second time in three years, it looked as if the curtain
might fall, if only temporarily, on the Memphis Symphony Orchestra.
It was last September and symphony musicians, who had been without
a contract since August, were threatening to go on strike. At
the last minute, citing “a responsibility to our ticket holders,”
the musicians decided to go on, and a few weeks later they were
rewarded with a new four-year contract that included their biggest
pay hike in recent memory.
It was an all-too-rare victory for Local 71 of the American Federation of Musicians, the union that represents the symphony players. Though few really believed that the musicians would walk out (there isn’t exactly an abundance of orchestral chairs around the country), fewer still believed they would come out on top in their latest tussle with management.
The past two decades have been lean ones for Local 71, which turns
100 years old this year and is one of the oldest musicians’ unions
in the country. Hampered by the city’s shrinking recording industry
and by the state’s “right to work” labor laws, the union has seen
its influence, and its membership, drop. More recently, new music-industry
organizations – groups like the recently formed Memphis & Shelby
County Music Commission and the local chapter of the National
Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences, which is currently in
negotiations with Beale Street merchants for a “musicians’ bill
of rights” that would grant Beale players some privileges like
parking priority – have sprung up, threatening to steal the union’s
role as the rallying point for local musicians. But unions are
on the resurgence across the country, and maybe, some hope. Last
fall’s symphony victory means Memphis’ storied musicans’ union
is primed for a return to prominence.
PHOTO COURTESY OF ROY BREWER
The Johnny Long Band was among the 1940s dance bands regularly
playing downtown Memphis clubs and hotels.
Protective music unions in the United States date back to the mid-1860s. By 1896, several in the Northeast combined to form one negotiating labor force, the American Federation of Musicians. Where the AFM had originally formed to regulate working conditions for touring opera and symphony orchestras, it found technology to be its chief opponent. During its reign, the AFM has had to negotiate with the advent of moving pictures, radio, recordings, and, more recently, synthesizers and digital sampling.
It is telling of Memphis’ musical heritage that local musicians unionized in 1873 to form one of America’s earliest unions. The Musicians’ Society was composed of local professionals, schooled musicians, and teachers who performed at parties, in theatres, and on touring showboats. The Memphis Protective Union was incorporated in 1895. Three years later, the state granted a charter to the Musicians’ Mutual Protective Union, and the national American Federation of Musicians awarded it a certificate of affiliation. The present title, Memphis Federation of Musicians, was adopted in 1914.
Prior to the turn of the century, the local union’s primary concern was negotiating for orchestras in the vaudeville and burlesque theatres downtown. The larger theatres, such as the Memphis Opera House (where The Orpheum now stands) and Pantages, could require anything from solo pianos to 15-piece orchestras to accompany touring stage shows. Smaller theaters required pit groups to perform generic, loosely synchronized mood music for silent films. At the peak of live musical activity in Memphis in 1910s and ’20s, union musicians often performed three or more shows per day, seven days a week. It was no coincidence that the MFM office was for a time located in The Orpheum, where musicians spent time playing Pinochle between shows.
But motion pictures quickly became more than a novelty, and by the depression, The Orpheum, Loew’s Palace, and other theatres were presenting a combination of stage and screen shows. Sometimes the local union musicians’ sole purpose was to simply perform overtures before the films, background music during intermissions (reel change), and exit music.
In the ’20s and ’30s, nightclub, saloon, dance hall, hotel, and restaurant jobs were also performed by many of the same union theatre musicians, even though they were not sanctioned jobs. It was through these $8 “spot jobs” that younger musicians could meet and mingle with the pit orchestra members in hopes of getting a more secure pit orchestra engagement.
Some of the more enterprising union musicians also found employment during the early years of Memphis radio. A select group of instrumentalists provided live music for product-sponsored 15-minute theme shows (i.e., Rufus Thomas’ legendary Pepticon show). Memphians were also treated to radio symphonies performed by union musicians under various project headings. During the depression, union musicians found refuge in federal Work Progress Administration orchestras performing at both the Overton Park Shell and on radio. And despite the hard times, Memphians were still able to support musicians playing out; The Peabody, The Chisca, The Claridge Hotel, and clubs on the top floors of many downtown buildings remained regular performance spots. Not by coincidence, the Local 71 office was relocated to the Hotel Gayoso.
By the late ’40s, with the backbone of its existence, pit orchestras, completely replaced by movie soundtracks, and the big band craze on the wane, the local union was faced with new troubles. The shift in popular tastes from traditional popular music to ethnic music changed the MFM probably more than any other factor. The definition of musician was redefined; simply put, reading printed music was no longer a factor in being a professional. (Many older musicians – from both country & western and R&B – blame this turn of events on Elvis Presley and his “three chord music.”) Until the late ’40s, country outfits like the Swift Jewel Cowboys, who were by all accounts making more money than the union musicians, were not allowed into the musicians’ union. Out of necessity, the local union eventually persuaded (some say “forced”) them to become members and secured a percentage of their pay in work dues. But African-American non-union musicians, who had been performing in stage bands on Beale Street for decades, were excluded from membership until the mid-’50s.
Despite the growing “amateurization” of music, however, national
touring shows requiring union players to augment bands and orchestras
were common throughout the ’40s. Shows like the Ice Capades, various
circus troupes, and supper club floor shows remained viable venues
for trained musicians relying on the union for support. And it
was during this era that the present Memphis Federation of Musicians
office building at 2282 Young Avenue was built under the supervision
of then-president Vernon Baty. But the local union’s best days
were still ahead of it, and the source of that prosperity would
come from an unlikely source.
PHOTO COURTESY OF ROY BREWER
In the ’30s and ’40s, many union musicians found work in local
radio. Above is the WMC Radio staff orchestra in 1942.
Union musicians were not part of the early studio recording sessions in Memphis. But by 1960, sessions at both Stax and Sun were paying union scale. A host of other recording studios enlisted union players and, gradually, the self-taught “non-professionals” recording at Memphis’ famous studios joined the union. Under the eye of president Bob Taylor, the the period from the late ’60s to 1980 was by far the most profitable one for the Memphis Federation of Musicians.
Today the MFA has a surprisingly large membership – between 380 and 400 members. The Memphis Symphony Orchestra makes up the largest block of that membership, but freelance dance bands and popular musicians are also represented.
The MFA has also expanded its role in recent years. Since the early ’90s, it has run Memphis Music Inc., an entertainment booking agency. And some local concerts are funded, in part, by the AFM’s Music Performance Trust Fund, a program in which the AFM matches funds with independent companies to promote live music in the community. Unfortunately, this fund is often overlooked by the public as a means of financing live shows.
But, for the most part, today’s musicans’ union lacks the teeth it once had. Currently, it is at the mercy of Tennessee’s “right to work” labor law. There are no performance venues in their jurisdiction, outside of recording studios, that require a musician to be in the Local 71 or the AFM. And as one peruses the membership roster, you realize, slowly and sadly, that the union’s membership list looks more and more like a historical artifact, full of names that are simply loyal vestiges of yesteryear. n