Musicians Plan To Protest Recorded Music Outside Lincoln Center

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) - A group of professional musicians plan to assemble outside Lincoln Center on Tuesday night to protest the complex's usage of canned music during performances.

The Paul Taylor Dance Company is set to begin its string of 21 performances tonight at Lincoln Center, marking the first time in the facility's illustrious history that a major ballet company will be accompanied by recorded music.

Sara Cutler, a harpist and the negotiating committee chair for the New York City Ballet orchestra, said she has had no luck trying to rectify the situation.

"For us, this is really an unacceptable situation," Cutler said. "We have tried to open a dialogue with both the Paul Taylor Company and Lincoln Center, and been rebuffed by both. Once of our concerns and one of the reasons we're staging this leafleting is to really let audiences know that they're being cheated out of something. They should get everything they paid for. This is Lincoln Center, this is New York, this is the center of the universe."

In an effort to maintain the long-standing tradition of only live music at Lincoln Center -- and to fight a potentially dangerous new precedent -- musicians are set to make themselves heard from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. outside the David H. Koch Theater. The protesters will hand out leaflets to audience members attending tonight's performance.

"Lincoln Center is the cultural center of the world," Tino Gagliardi, President of the Associated Musicians of Greater New York, said. "And to see that kind of diminishment of the art form at the Koch Theater is truly egregious, from an artistic sense."

The highlight of the protest is expected to occur at 6:30 p.m. on the steps of Lincoln Center, where a brass quintet will perform two numbers to emphasize the power and essence that they believe only live music can provide.

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