Measuring emotion through quality: evaluating the musical repertoires of Spanish symphonic orchestras Mafalda Gómez-Vega and Luis César Herrero-Prieto University of Valladolid, Spain
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[email protected] - Universidad de Valladolid Departamento de Economía Aplicada y Grupo de Investigación Reconocido en Economía de la Cultura Facultad de Comercio Plaza Campus Universitario, 1, 47011-Valladolid, Spain Tel. +34 983 423 577 www.emp.uva.es/giec Abstract: Our goal is to assess the quality of the repertoire of Spanish symphony orchestras and to gauge the impact of a series of external variables on the decisions concerning these institutions’ musical programmes. We take a sample of 20 professional symphony orchestras covering the last three seasons from 2014 to 2017. First, we seek to summarise the quality in the repertoire of the orchestras through three partial indices (contemporaneity, most well-known composers and conventionality) before constructing a composite quality indicator using Data Envelopment Analysis. The result of this indicator is subsequently considered to be a dependent variable in a regression analysis, with the aim of analysing the determinant effect on the programme quality of various external variables, some related to the internal management of the orchestras, others addressing the socio-economic contextual aspects of the area in which they are located. Keywords: symphonic orchestras, repertoires evaluation, synthetic index of quality, data envelopment analysis, cluster analysis. 1. Introduction. The principal objectives pursued by symphony orchestras as cultural institutions are closely linked to artistic quality and to the social impact of their musical activities. However, matters become complicated when attempting to quantify the results of these goals.