Write to ENO management urging them to reconsider their proposals using our template letter. Image credit: The MU ©
English National Opera (ENO) is planning to axe 19 posts in the orchestra and employ the remaining musicians on part-time contracts. Some musicians will lose 70% of their work.
Support musicians campaigning to save their jobs and ENO's future
Please write to ENO management urging them to reconsider their proposals using our template letter below.
Remember to add in your experiences with ENO and thoughts on the importance of access to world-class arts and culture for all.
Send your letter to london@theMU.org with ‘FAO ENO Management’ in the subject line, and the union will organise a mass delivery.
Opera is a life-long passion; ENO should have a full-time future
Members will be outside ENO leafleting ahead of a showing of La Traviata on Tuesday 7 November.
If you’re attending the performance, please pick up a leaflet and share a message of support on social media using the hashtags #WeAreENO and #SaveENO.
Template letter to ENO management
Dear Jenny Mollica (Interim Chief Executive Officer of the ENO & London Coliseum),
I am writing to you to urgently reconsider proposals to axe 19 jobs and employ the remaining musicians on part-time contracts.
English National Opera should be a full-time company with the orchestra in full-time jobs and on full-time pay.
Your proposals will mean that working for ENO will no longer be a viable option for many musicians working there now, and young/upcoming talent aspiring to work there in the future.
If ENO is forced to move outside of London without its world-class orchestra and chorus, regional audiences won't be getting the full ENO experience. ENO is more than a brand, it's a group of talented, highly skilled people working together as a company day in and day out. Audiences outside London deserve the same quality regardless of their postcode.
These proposals are particularly devastating because it was the support and campaigning of the unions representing musicians in the orchestra, performers in the chorus and people working front of house that helped achieve an improved Arts Council England funding settlement in autumn 2023.Opera is a life-long passion. ENO should have a full-time future - as a full-time company with the orchestra in full-time jobs and on full-time pay.
Please reconsider these proposals urgently.