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99 dollar orchestra?

YuHirà said:
I agree that we can't except quality with the Lisbon Orchestra (99 dollars / euros for a 7 minute session with a 30-piece orchestra... it's really low-cost, far more than in Eastern Europe). Of course, we could reasonably except a greater quality with Premium sessions at Abbey Road since the prices are fair. But if you only book one 7 minute session, it may be tricky: it's partly composer's responsability. I don't think we can blame entirely the company for this reason.
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You can blame the company. This is not your fault in any way. They claimed they could provide something for a specific price. They took your money and did not provide the service they promised. They are responsible for not delivering what you paid for. It's up to them to refund your money or make it right.

Do NOT blame yourself. This company has shown a pattern of behavior that is inexcusable. It frustrates those of us who provide this service properly because it can reflect poorly on the musicians, the fixers/contractors, and everyone else in our industry who takes pride in their work.
 
Sad to hear that so many of you have had problems with this company (can empathize). Yet, I can’t believe André and company would have gone through the trouble of getting this venture launched only to see it fail, hear his team regularly excoriated. In my case it was suggested that I do a core session with the London players (for best quality), sweetening this with the orchestra in Lisbon. Ironically, any questions I had (pre-billing) were dealt with within 24 hours. Once the projected date had passed I was, like so many of you, completely ignored. Despite, apparent, good intentions, I think $99 Orch simply overpromises and underdelivers. Too bad too because I know people who actually want to give them their business but only after first knowing my result. Since it’s not my nature to disparage a person or a business I choose to stay mum, hoping the subject doesn’t again come up.

Hope André and his team eventually comes through for all of you (us).
 
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Just wanted to report that I had a similar experience with 99Orchestra. Booked a session for January 2017. Turned out the piece was never recorded. Was promised several re-bookings, never materialized, finally requested a refund, no response. Seems as if the website is down now, and I'm another customer out $600 USD. For posterity's sake I figured I would post my story here.
 
I wasted $160 with them. When will they stop getting money from people without delivering? Also, with the credibility from the 99$ orchestra, I wouldn't trust them with any other "premium" projects.
 
Geez, I'm sorry for you guys that had this happen to you. I was considering this route for getting one of my shorter pieces recorded but I've decided not to now. What a predatory world we live in huh?
 
dcoscina said:
What a predatory world we live in huh?
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I don't think this is predatory. I think it's simple incompetence.

The company has shown on multiple occasions that they don't know how to properly handle projects like this, and they appear to not understand why things cost what they do.

This is what can happen when people have more ambition than skills. That's why other industries where people can be hurt like medicine and construction have licenses and inspectors.
 
BillB said:
Hope André and his team eventually comes through for all of you (us).
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As far as I'm concerned, I don't hope anymore :) My friend and I sent several messages these last weeks but didn't receive any answer.

I usually try not to have prejudices about people but in this case, I'm pretty sure that we were victims of a fraud. An incompetent person still answers and tries to make things right. He does not vanish when things go wrong...

We could bring together a class action, by the way. I read that the Law of Portugal provides a very interesting type of class action, the "acção popular", with an opting out system: by default, each client of the company is considered as a plaintiff.

The only problem is that I didn't manage to find any company address, either on the website or the WHOIS :-D In retrospect, I realise that this fact was solely a reason not to contract with them :-D
 
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YuHirà said:
As far as I'm concerned, I don't hope anymore :) My friend and I sent several messages these last weeks but didn't receive any answer.

I usually try not to have prejudices about people but in this case, I'm pretty sure that we were victims of a fraud. An incompetent person still answers and tries to make things right. He does not vanish when things go wrong...

We could bring together a class action, by the way. I read that the Law of Portugal provides a very interesting type of class action, the "acção popula", with an opting out system: by default, every client of the company is considered as a plaintiff.

The only problem is that I didn't manage to find any company address, either on the website or the WHOIS :-D In retrospect, I realise that this fact was solely a reason not to contract with them :-D
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We have his Paypal info though. It includes his phone number and email address. They probably have more info too.
 
JJP said:
I don't think this is predatory. I think it's simple incompetence.
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Yeah JJ I have a sneaking suspicion about all of these "My piece wasn't even recorded on the announced day" posts. How can that even happen? Well I can think of one way... if they have a backlog of un-recorded pieces from previous sessions, or makeup sessions promised to unsatisfied customers. But the core issues with the idea persist, which means they can't get through it all and more people fall off the back end of the schedule. To be told "Don't worry we'll do you at the next set of sessions," etc
 
NoamL said:
Yeah JJ I have a sneaking suspicion about all of these "My piece wasn't even recorded on the announced day" posts. How can that even happen? Well I can think of one way... if they have a backlog of un-recorded pieces from previous sessions, or makeup sessions promised to unsatisfied customers. But the core issues with the idea persist, which means they can't get through it all and more people fall off the back end of the schedule. To be told "Don't worry we'll do you at the next set of sessions," etc
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I had read in earlier posts where André offered to re-record earlier pieces for free (should have seen that red flag), which indeed could have created quite the backlog of pieces. I was told in early January that sessions were ‘filling up fast’ and that I needed to get my sessions booked sooner than later.

I suggest that if $99 Orchestra is to survive they will need to offer a no questions asked, money back guarantee offer if one’s project isn’t recorded within, say, two session periods. I have a feeling that much of the money people spent (for me, €1000 to record three minutes of simple to moderately challenging music) is going, not into the staff’s pockets, but rather for things such as doubling fees, BMU penalties, music prep, overtime, etc., in effect creating this vicious cycle where ‘Peter is robbed to pay Paul.’ The other thing is that they need to be consistent when stating the amount of music that is possible to record within a certain time frame, not “changing the rules” as you begin to click ‘pay now.’

$99 Orchestra is a great concept—the idea that one can book musicians without having to go through the headache of trying to coordinate bookings of both musicians AND studio is, in a word, wonderful. Just hope it gets it’s damn act together (start by calling it the €99 Orchestra as it’s not actually $99).
 
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Matt Riley said:
We have his Paypal info though. It includes his phone number and email address. They probably have more info too.
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Matt- Do you know anyone who has tried to get his/her money back via Pay Pal? From what I understand you have 180 days to lodge a complaint. Also, what if $99 Orchestra tries one of its go-to come backs: ‘piece isn’t well orchestrated,’ ‘more time needed to be booked,’ etc. Would Pay Pal then consider the complaint action closed? In other words does $99 Orch, as PP seller, “hold all of the cards?”
 
BillB said:
the idea that one can book musicians without having to go through the headache of trying to coordinate bookings of both musicians AND studio is, in a word, wonderful.
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There are plenty of people who do this. They charge a reasonable, i.e. higher, fee because that's what it takes to do the job properly and ensure that you get the results you expect.
 
BillB said:
Matt- Do you know anyone who has tried to get his/her money back via Pay Pal? From what I understand you have 180 days to lodge a complaint. Also, what if $99 Orchestra tries one of its go-to come backs: ‘piece isn’t well orchestrated,’ ‘more time needed to be booked,’ etc. Would Pay Pal then consider the complaint action closed? In other words does $99 Orch, as PP seller, “hold all of the cards?”
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I was actually able to get my money back from Andre. It was a small amount because I was testing the waters. I created a dispute via Paypal but they said I would have to work it out with the seller because of the more than 180 days had passed. So I sent email after email to Andre as described earlier in this thread and he finally refunded my money in January. Again, it was a small amount so I don't know if he would have given me a refund if the amount was higher like some you.
 
Hello everyone!

To my great surprise, I finally received this morning a mail from my friend with a link to the PT session of my piece! I was surprised... since I didn't expect it anymore :)

The result is quite acceptable and workable. The only issue is that I'm not sure that it was recorded at Abbey Road as agreed. I'm going to submit my PT to a friend in order to check that.
 
YuHirà said:
Hello everyone!

To my great surprise, I finally received this morning a mail from my friend with a link to the PT session of my piece! I was surprised... since I didn't expect it anymore :)

The result is quite acceptable and workable. The only issue is that I'm not sure that it was recorded at Abbey Road as agreed. I'm going to submit my PT to a friend in order to check that.
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Hi. Yes, I received my PT session today as well and am also quite pleased as the reading by André and the London players was excellent. I know the January session was at AR2 but assumed they went back to Metropolis for the March date. Still waiting for my Epic Orch and London brass audio, but, really, happy I got anything (even if the result had been substandard, which this reading certainly was not).

My feeling from the get-go was that André and team were overwhelmed from having to re-record 2017 projects that we might have to wait until another session date was confirmed to have our music recorded. Still, they need to work on improving customer inquiries/concerns (which could only help their business, curtail potential negative word-of-mouth). I recommend they offer some kind of additional discount if your piece is not recorded on the date promised (even 10% would satisfy most people).

Anyway, happy you got your tracks, YuHirà!
 
Admittedly, I'm happy to have something to hear (and I'm very happy for you too :-D ), but André still broke our contract :-( I signed and paid for a session in January, at Abbey Road and not at Metropolis. I never would have bought a session if it was planned to take place somewhere else :-(
 
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Glad that you are happy with your tracks but it is still not good enough, as mentioned I paid $600 USD in November 2016... no refund nothing not even an email. Lots of undelivered promises. What's so difficult about communicating?
If it's indeed going to be recorded at the "next session" when is that..?
 
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