Facing The Music

For decades, every summer, Guilford College has come alive with young musicians bustling down sidewalks, carrying their instruments as centuries-old oak trees offer shade from the afternoon sun. String instruments hum, mixing with the soft tones from a nearby piano. These are the sounds of the Eastern Music Festival, which has been held on the campus for the last 62 years. But this year, the landscape is quiet.

In February, the annual five-week summer music festival, which draws hundreds of students from around the country every year, was abruptly canceled. This came after mounting tension between faculty musicians, who teach the festival’s students every year, and the organization’s board and administration. 

After years of what they call mismanagement and lack of development, faculty artists have unionized. Their goal is to increase salaries and maintain enough musicians to teach and put on annual concerts. To stay sustainable, administrators argue they must be flexible with programming and, ultimately, staffing. Six months later, the two sides are now attempting to reach an agreement on the core mission of EMF to preserve the historic institution.

Trouble Begins 

EMF was founded by Sheldon “Shelly” Morgenstern in 1961 as a small music camp where high school students could learn classical music. Professional musicians from around the country gathered at Guilford College to instruct eager teens and perform alongside them over the summer. That first year, there were about 70 students and a few dozen faculty. The festival has since grown to approximately 250 students each year, taught by about 60 faculty artists. 

In 2020, during the pandemic, the festival was canceled for the first time in its history. The following year, it operated at limited capacity. While the festival returned in full force in 2022, the pandemic’s disruption hit the organization hard, according to EMF Executive Director Chris Williams.

“It shook every small nonprofit to their core,” Williams said. “But we found a way through it.”

That meant cutting the number of faculty, according to the musicians. In 2021, when the festival returned, student enrollment had fallen from 265 to 190. Faculty artist positions declined from 75 to about 60. When the festival returned to full capacity in 2022, student enrollment returned to near pre–pandemic levels of about 250. The number of faculty artists remained the same.

Fewer teachers meant an increased workload for those who remained—something they say became unmanageable. Most faculty artists are professionals employed by orchestras and symphonies around the country. To participate in EMF, they take five weeks out of the summer to travel to Greensboro and teach students. It’s not a huge moneymaker, according to Matt Decker, a percussionist in the Seattle Symphony who attended EMF as a student and then taught there for nine years.

“It is a lot of hours, and a lot of those hours you are not compensated for,” Decker said.

Faculty artists say they are responsible for recruiting potential students to the festival every year. Williams pushed back, saying that EMF has a full-time educational director who handles that process. While the faculty does play a small role in attracting students, Williams said, fewer faculty wouldn’t affect the recruitment process. But faculty artists say they also spend time combing through about a thousand applications to choose 200-300 final students. 

Once the festival is set, faculty artists have to pay to travel to Greensboro. EMF does not reimburse travel expenses, according to the artists. Faculty say they’ve only gotten a $200 raise in the last decade—when the festival returned in 2022.  Williams disputes that.

Collective Power

Faculty artists began discussing unionizing during the 2023 summer festival. They looped students in on their plans and gained support from other symphonies across the country. In November, after EMF administrators declined to voluntarily recognize the union, the faculty put the question to a vote. Ninety percent voted to unionize.

Their ask was simple, they thought: an increase in pay and a housing stipend.

Most of the musicians choose to stay on Guilford College’s campus in one of two apartment complexes each summer, said John Shaw, a musician with the Florida Orchestra and principal percussionist at EMF. Each apartment has four bedrooms and either one or two bathrooms. Two musicians usually share a unit, splitting the cost, which ranges from $1,600 to $2,300 for the five-week duration, according to emails shared with The Thread. EMF pays for their housing up front, but then deducts the cost from faculty paychecks. 

In their final offer to faculty in February, EMF administration offered a base pay increase and a $750 housing stipend. But the math doesn’t add up, according to Shaw. Prior to union negotiations, artists were paid anywhere from $4,600 to $5,900 per summer based on their position in the orchestra. They also made $450 per student they taught. In its offer, EMF stated that musicians who taught at least five students would get paid $8,000, plus a $750 housing stipend. Those who taught four students or fewer would be paid $6,000, plus $750 for housing. 

For Shaw, that amounts to a decrease, since he is a principal musician in the orchestra. If he taught five students under the current model, he would be making about $8,200. In fact, for some of the musicians, the new model would be a significant pay cut, he said.

But the faculty had one more sticking point. Tired of their shrinking numbers, they asked the administration for a commitment to keep the 61 current positions to preserve the low student-to-faculty ratio, Shaw said. 

The EMF board and administration didn’t agree. Williams said EMF wants the flexibility to adjust faculty numbers based on student applications and trends in the music world.

“Cutting the faculty is not our goal,” Williams said. “What we want to do is keep as many top faculty as possible. For that, we offered a strong pay increase back in February that they rejected. … We need flexibility to adjust programs and adjust staffing as needed to meet the needs of our students.”

But if the goal is to meet the needs of the students, Shaw asked, why cut faculty?

“We’re trying to adhere to the core purpose of EMF,” Shaw said. “They’re trying to make it seem as though [the festival] has gotten away from educating young students. But we are trying to continue to do that in the best way possible.”

Part of the appeal of having enough faculty members to field a professional orchestra is that the students can witness their teachers perform each week, Shaw said. 

“We’re unique in the fact that you’ve got a professional orchestra in which the kids can observe us, and some kids get chosen to perform with us,” Shaw said. “That’s a thrilling thing for a student. That’s like getting to play shortstop with the New York Yankees or something like that.”

Without the current number of faculty members, this becomes increasingly difficult to do, Shaw said.

Sophie Mok, assistant conductor of the North Carolina Symphony, attended EMF in 2021. She is among many students who say these performances are an important part of the experience. That summer, she had the opportunity to conduct the student orchestras, as well as the professional orchestra made up of the faculty artists.

“That’s very different than other festivals,” Mok said. “For me, I get to take notes based on what’s going on and how the maestro is working with the faculty. It’s one of the only times you get to see a professional orchestra rehearsing.”

The weekly faculty artists’ concerts also draw hundreds of community members through ticketed performances. Fewer faculty means the inability to host those concerts, Shaw said.

Since starting negotiations in January 2024, faculty artists have gone back and forth with administration, even compromising on pay increases if they could maintain the faculty size. Each time, the EMF board and Williams said no, according to Shaw. 

Then, in February, without warning, the EMF board and administration canceled this year’s festival. Faculty say they found out through social media.

This prompted the union to file an unfair labor practice charge against the organization, said Rochelle Skolnick, the director of symphonic services for the American Federation of Musicians of the United States and Canada, or AFM. The faculty musicians are unionized under AFM.

The charge was filed in March, and a final deliberation by the National Labor Relations Board is pending. Currently, the board lacks a quorum. But in July, President Trump nominated two people for the board, which would restore it and allow decisions to continue, if appointees are confirmed by the U.S. Senate. No date for a possible confirmation has been set yet.

The cancellation of the festival put EMF on the American Federation of Musicians’ International Unfair List, which signals to union musicians that they should avoid working there. Working for organizations on the list is akin to crossing a picket line.

For the next four months, faculty artists didn’t hear from EMF. Then, in late July, negotiations between the two parties started again. In the background, a third party has been working to help the faculty artists succeed in their mission. Their contributions could alter the future of the organization.

Morgenstern and Co.

Barbara Morgenstern met her ex-husband, Shelly Morgenstern, in the mid-seventies—about a decade after he started the Eastern Music Festival. 

They got married in 1978. For the 13 years they were together, Barbara Morgenstern was “very, very involved” with EMF, she said. After their divorce, she took a break from the festival but later returned to its board, which she chaired until 2013. Shelly Morgenstern died in 2007.

Now, Morgenstern is working with a group of funders to raise money to keep EMF’s mission intact, she said. So far, the group has raised over $1 million. The problem, as she sees it, isn’t just labor or about the festival’s model. It’s about something much simpler—a long-term need for more money.

Morgenstern believes the generosity of the Greensboro community will keep EMF alive. Working with about a dozen longtime EMF enthusiasts over the last year, she says, she has helped raise more than enough money to retain all of the faculty, pay for their housing, and give them the raises they deserve.

“The whole program is internationally recognized, and there’s absolutely no reason for it to change the model it’s had for 64 years,” she said.

In the first few months after the festival’s cancellation, the group raised about $360,000 to cover salary increases over three years. A few months later, it was up to $720,000. Now, it’s a little over $1 million.

The catch?

In exchange for the money, Morgenstern’s group wants to appoint six members to EMF’s board, which currently has 20 seats. Putting herself and her funders on the board, she said, will ensure that EMF stays financially sustainable for years to come. 

Williams said they haven’t received any documentation or details about the funds since earlier this year.

“Without clarity on the source, terms, or structure of these alleged funds, it is neither possible nor responsible for EMF to react to that figure,” Williams said in an email. 

Appointing the outside group to the board and accepting the union’s proposal raises “serious governance concerns,” Williams said.

“Some of the individuals proposed for leadership roles were previously involved in decisions that placed EMF in difficult and precarious financial positions,” Williams said.

But others appear to share Morgenstern’s opinion that systemic change is needed.

EMF has an honorary board comprised of some of the biggest names in Triad philanthropy. Among them are Joseph M. Bryan Jr. and Jeanne L. Tannenbaum, who recently asked entertainment lawyer Bryan Hindin to conduct an independent investigation into EMF’s finances. (Hindin’s grandfather, Samuel M. LeBauer, is also an honorary board member.) 

Hindin pulled EMF’s financial data over the last decade and examined key metrics such as expenditures, donations, and revenue. What he found reflected what Morgenstern and faculty artists have been saying for years.

“There’s been long-term financial instability of the festival,” Hindin said. “I attribute it to a decline of marketing and development.”

He also noted a decade of mismanagement and operational issues stemming from Williams, who was hired in 2014.

“Chris Williams took [EMF] more in the direction of a corporate model,” Hindin said. 

There’s more than enough money in Greensboro to sustain EMF with the right fundraising, Hindin said.

To an extent, it appears the EMF board and administration agree. In recent weeks, they hired a fundraising strategy company, RSC Associates, Williams said. 

“We’re putting good effort into fundraising,” said Anne Starr Denny, the board chair for EMF.

Even with the extra funds, questions of whether the faculty will get to keep their numbers remain. That’s why in the last few months, the faculty artists have taken their pleas to the public, hosting concerts that have drawn hundreds of attendees. 

‘A Labor of Love’

In late June, the faculty artists held an awareness concert at Temple Emanuel, drawing around 600 people, many of whom have attended EMF concerts for decades.

“We’ve been coming for the last 20 years,” said Catharine Sisk. She and her husband, Ken, have attended at least five concerts over the years and have enjoyed watching the students and faculty perform. 

“It’s always excellent,” Ken Sisk said. “The enthusiasm is obvious. We would like for it to continue.”

Joe Gruendler, who has lived in Greensboro for over 50 years, said EMF is unique. Nowhere else can community members see such high-level orchestral performances every summer for such affordable prices, he said.

“I just want it to continue like it has for the last 60 years,” Gruendler said.

Many of the attendees who came to the concert at Temple Emanuel did so from assisted living homes like Well-Spring. The senior living community has long been an EMF supporter and a generous sponsor. In late July, the venue was set to host the faculty artists’ second concert. A few days before the event, however, Well-Spring rescinded its agreement. Lynn Wooten, the executive vice president for communications and public relations at Kintura, the parent organization of Well-Spring, said he did so after receiving an email from Williams.

“He said that it was not an actual EMF event and that it was being done by the faculty,” Wooten said. “He enumerated many points of why he felt this was not appropriate.”

Wooten, who said he didn’t know about the event until receiving Williams’ email, said that Well-Spring doesn’t want to be in the middle of a labor dispute. The event was moved to Guilford College United Methodist Church.

“Even the perception that Well-Spring could be siding with or furthering the efforts of one side, that’s not what we’re here to do,” Wooten said. “Our hope is that they get through this and do what they do best, which is make music.”

Williams says he’s hopeful for that outcome, and is confident the festival will return in 2026. EMF has confirmed dates with Guilford College for next year’s festival and is building student recruitment calendars now, he said.

But the faculty aren’t so sure. They maintain that they want to keep their current numbers and have the outside funding to do so. 

“If I waved my wand, Chris Williams would be gone,” said Decker, who resigned from EMF in 2024. “All they’re doing is self protecting. They’ve vilified the musicians. Meanwhile, they have no festival.”

One year without a festival is hard enough for a small nonprofit arts organization. Two could be disastrous. But no matter which side they fall on, everyone maintains that EMF must continue. It’s a 60-year-old tradition that has a unique model and a history of producing talented musicians.

“If you ask any student, they will say that the Eastern Music Festival changed their life,” Morgenstern said. “And the faculty, one of them has been coming for 41 years. This is a labor of love.”

Correction: An earlier version of this story read that EMF was founded in 1962. It has been updated to reflect that it took place in 1961.