There’s a tremendous amount of history around the concept of a composer’s union in film and television industries, and most of it is bad news for composers.You can read the highlights here. Last night I attended a meeting hosted by the Teamsters Local 399 toward formation of a composer’s union here in Los Angeles. It was good to see so many (hundreds, in fact) composers interested enough to attend, gather some info, and be seen at such a meeting. It was also interesting to see who *wasn’t* there, which was also discussed at the meeting in a surprisingly open fashion. Here is a link to my take on the evening’s proceedings, so I won’t repeat them here. Regardless of the obvious (and not-so-obvious) factors against unionization of composers, I think it’s a worthy public discussion to have. I’m hopeful that something positive will come from it, but not optimistic that it will lead to the formation of a union that will be worth its salt. As I said in my post on Northernsounds forum – there’s something darkly attractive about embracing a lost cause – and I have a feeling that I’ll be seeing this one through to the bitter end.
