Eun Sun Kim has been in the headlines even more than usual lately. San Francisco Opera’s music director was the subject of a recent video documentary, is conducting her first production of Richard Wagner’s Tristan and Isolde, and has now had her contract with the company extended.
The announcement from SF Opera reads, “With this five-year extension through the 2030–2031 season, Kim will continue to shape the musical vision of San Francisco Opera into its second century. This will include her initiative to conduct major operas by two of the art form’s most important composers — Giuseppe Verdi and Richard Wagner — each season, continuing next fall with a brand-new production of Wagner’s final opera, Parsifal, leading to Wagner’s monumental Ring cycle in a future season.
“The fourth music director in San Francisco Opera’s 102-year history, Seoul-born Eun Sun Kim began her music directorship in the fall of 2021, leading the company’s reemergence from the global pandemic and into its historic 2022–2023 centennial season.”
Kim said, “We work in an art form that has been told, every day for hundreds of years, that it is on the precipice of an existential crisis. And yet, opera endures.
“Thanks to the unwavering dedication of orchestras and choruses, artists and makers, administrators and audiences, we are able to create and share moments of collective transformation. In honor of those who believe, as I do, that the work we do matters deeply, I have accepted the offer to renew my commitment to San Francisco Opera.”
Kim’s salary for fiscal year 2023 was approximately $600,000, according to SF Opera’s last available IRS Form 990, the amount expected to be increased in the new contract.
The musicians of the SF Opera Orchestra, whose contract expired at the end of July and is being negotiated by Musicians Union Local 5 — with a temporary settlement reached for the month of September — responded to the news about Kim in a statement:
“The Orchestra is very pleased that she will continue in her role for the foreseeable future. However, we remain deeply concerned that the Opera appears unwilling to invest in the musicians who bring Maestro Kim’s vision to life.
“Our negotiations with Opera management have continued over recent weeks, but their proposals to date are unacceptable. Not only does management’s lone offer for a contract beyond this season cut the Orchestra’s working conditions, benefits, and pay relative to inflation, it also drastically reduces the number of musicians in our complement.”
A former San Francisco Symphony musician, responding to the Opera Orchestra’s statement in a public comment on social media, wrote: “At least you guys have a music director.” This is in reference to SF Symphony Music Director Esa-Pekka Salonen’s decision, announced in March, not to extend his contract, which expires at the end of the 2024–2025 season. The musicians of the SF Symphony themselves are currently on a contract that runs through Nov. 18; the SF Symphony Chorus went on strike last month.
As labor negotiations at both the SF Symphony and SF Opera are nearing the possibility of strikes, the organizations’ music directors — who walk the line between management and musicians’ labor — are remaining neutral in their public stances, as is customary.
Conductors who were the rare exception and took a stand include the Minnesota Orchestra’s Osmo Vänskä, who resigned in support of his musicians, and the Chicago Symphony’s Riccardo Muti.