The Hong Kong Philharmonic has refused to disclose the salary of its chief conductor, Edo de Waart, after sources close to the orchestra claimed he was paid at least HK$8 million a year.
The sum would make the Dutch maestro the second-highest-paid public figure in Hong Kong after Joseph Yam Chi-kwong, chief executive of the Monetary Authority, but would mean he is paid barely half what top conductors in the United States earn.
In contrast, Yip Wing-sie, musical director of the city's second professional orchestra, the Hong Kong Sinfonietta, earns HK$600,000-plus.
The Philharmonic received HK$58.8 million in public funding this financial year - more than half its annual budget of HK$109 million.
De Waart, who is internationally renowned as an orchestra-builder, was recruited by the Philharmonic in 2004 with a mandate to turn it around. His five-year contract requires him to work with the orchestra for 14 weeks a year. He is also chief conductor of the Santa Fe Opera in the US state of New Mexico.
Lorin Maazel, the septuagenarian music director of the New York Philharmonic, was paid US$1.9 million (HK$14.9 million) in 2005, according to New York Magazine's most recent salary guide.
The Philharmonic is one of five major government-subsidised arts bodies that refused to disclose the salaries of their top executives for a South China Morning Post survey.
