The music director of the English National Opera has announced his resignation over proposed cuts across the charity.
Martyn Brabbins said proposed changes to the charity were driving “a coach and horses through the artistic integrity of the whole of ENO as a performing company”.
The Musicians’ Union said the ENO plans to cut 19 musical staff positions and move the rest of its musicians to part-time contracts.
The move to part-time contracts would result in a pay decrease of 40 per cent, according to the union.
The ENO attributed the move to financial difficulties including paying back its Covid-19 recovery loan as of next year and its compulsory move out of London to continue receiving funding from Arts Council England, according to the MU.
Brabbins described the ENO’s plan to be “managed decline” as opposed to an attempt to “rebuild the company”.
He said: “As music director of ENO for the past seven years, and head of its orchestra, chorus and music staff, I cannot in all conscience continue to support the board and management’s strategy for the future of the company.
“While my feelings on this have been developing for some time, it reached its nadir this week, with the internal announcement of severe cuts to its orchestra and chorus from the 2024/25 season.
“In protest, this afternoon I tendered my resignation with immediate effect.”
In 2016, the former music director at the ENO, Mark Wigglesworth, also resigned over changes made because of budget cuts at the charity.
He said in his resignation letter that the ENO was evolving “into something I do not recognise”.
The ENO responded to Brabbins’ statement on X, formerly Twitter, expressing its disappointment and surprise that he had ended his tenure so “abruptly”.
The statement said: “After nine months of negotiation with Arts Council England, the ENO has reached a position where we are confident we can maintain a substantial level of operatic work – as opposed to the original reality of total redundancy across the entire company (following ACE’s previous decision to remove the ENO as a national portfolio organisation in November 2022).
“As recorded in board minutes, an all-staff meeting and in correspondence with management and the board, Martyn agreed that the position reached with ACE In July 2023 provides a workable outcome.
“As the ENO’s musical leader, we are disappointed that Martyn has chosen to resign rather than support the company by engaging with the process of creating a sustainable future for the ENO.”
The ENO had an income of £20.1m with a deficit of £1m in the year to the end of July 2021, as the charity was forced to shut its doors for more than a year because of the Covid-19 pandemic.
In July, the Arts Council announced a grant of £24m for the ENO for the period April 2024 to March 2026, which will pay for the establishment of a new main base outside of London.
This decision was made in response to requests from the government to redistribute arts funding to outside of the capital.
Last week, Third Sector revealed the ENO was facing compulsory strike-off action after a failure to file its accounts.
The charity is also overdue in filing accounts with the Charity Commission by 138 days and blamed the delay on waiting for confirmation of its ACE subsidy.
Companies House has since said that “compulsory strike-off action has been discontinued”.
The ENO did not respond to requests for comment on how the issue was resolved but said last week that the issue would “be resolved as soon as the accounts are filed”.