The Sound of Museums (revisited)
I wrote these a while ago, but I think they really belong here. After reading a report on how museum pay, particularly that of curators, has been falling begind that of comparable sectors, I was inspired to begin a parody of ‘Maria’ from the Sound of Music (suitably re-titled ‘Career’):
Career
[The scene: a department of Museum Studies. Several students discuss their prospects with a tutor. For unknown reasons they are all dressed as nuns.]
Berthe: Unlock the door into the store, the floor has got a leak
Sophia: I’m feeling so frustrated that it’s very hard to speak
Berthe: To fix a simple window, it will take at least a week
Catherine: So is it any wonder that I’m crabby?
Agatha: To get a start you work for free
Sophia: Oh, come on now, get real!
Berthe: You’ve fallen far behind your friends
Catherine: And that you can’t conceal
Berthe: I hate to have to say it, but I very firmly feel
All four: Curating’s not an asset to your CV
Margaretta: I’d like to say a word in its behalf
R. Mother: Then say it Sister Margaretta
Margaretta: The salary makes me laugh!
How do you get to have a good career?
How do you get a job with lots of pay?
What I desire, I’d like to make it clear,
Is oodles of money, enormously long holidays.
Many’s the path I’ve tried and then abandoned,
Many’s the time I’ve tried to find a rôle.
Accountancy won’t impress
And teaching’s too full of stress
And being a lawyer drives you up the pole
Oh, how do you get to have a good career
One where your worth’s reflected in your pay?
When I’m working I’m confused
Out of focus, unamused
And I never know exactly where I am.
Re-arranging the exhibits
Oh, it really is the limit
When you’re promised that tomorrow you’ll get jam.
Under-funded, under-staffed
Should I cry or should I laugh?
Should I try to fix the leak inside the store?
Then I feel my pulses quicken,
Run round like a headless chicken
As the time for budget cuts rolls round once more.
How do you get to have a good career?
How do you get a job with lots of pay?
What I desire, I’d like to make it clear,
Is oodles of money, enormously long holidays.
Many’s the path I’ve tried and then abandoned,
Many’s the time I’ve tried to find a rôle.
Accountancy won’t impress
And teaching’s too full of stress
And being a lawyer drives you up the pole
Oh, how do you get to have a good career
One where your worth’s reflected in your pay?
Of course, then I had to write some more, like this:
Do-re-mi
Let’s start at the very beginning
A very good place to start
Now in most jobs you start on a salary
In museums at first you work for free
Work for free?
The first three years are voluntary
Work for free?
(spoken) Let’s see if I can make it easy…
Dough, I fear, we lack my dears
Raids from elsewhere left us short
Meetings on more budget cuts
Far, far worse than I had thought
So forget what I have said
Laugh as if you didn’t know
Teetering right on the edge
And it all comes back to dough…
(spoken) Now, meetings and budgets and so on are only the tools we use to build a service. Once you have the notes in your heads, you can sing a million different tunes by mixing them up. Like this…
When you know the notes to sing
You can get project funding.