“Just last year, the Bellevue Philharmonic Orchestra’s very survival appeared at risk,” writes Nicole Tsong in Sunday’s (8/8) Seattle Times. “The orchestra had barely made it through its 2008-09 season, which was marred by canceled concerts, unpaid debt and tension between orchestra members and its management. With financial help from the Bellevue City Council, the orchestra pulled together its finances, changed its leadership, worked with its musicians on a new contract and hoped the 2009-10 season would be better. It was, but even as recently as this spring, the orchestra’s board of directors contemplated a scaled-down season for 2010-11, limited to Handel’s Messiah and the Fourth of July concert. But the board instead decided to try and raise $50,000 by July 1 and was confident enough in May to ask director Michael Miropolsky to put together a 2010-2011 season similar to the one that just ended … With just 410 seats at the Meydenbauer Center, its main venue, the orchestra has to play each of its major concerts twice. … Orchestra leaders hope that situation will improve in just a few years. That’s when the Tateuchi Center, formerly known as the Performing Arts Center Eastside (PACE), will open its new performing arts center, a 2,000-seat hall.”
Posted August 9, 2010
