In Tuesday’s (8/6) Houston CultureMap, Joel Luks reports, “Brian A. Ritter has been appointed the new executive director of Mercury – The Orchestra Redefined, a position he will officially assume beginning in September. He replaces departing executive director Deborah Lugo, who after 10 years with Mercury stepped down to pursue graduate-level studies in public policy at Princeton University in New Jersey. A national search committee had first made contact with Ritter, a resident of Albany, N.Y., in June.… The 37-year-old had previously served as executive director of the Albany Symphony and the Rockford Symphony Orchestra (where current Houston Symphony CEO Mark Hanson was Ritter’s predecessor) and as development director for the Allentown Symphony Orchestra in Allentown, Pa., Ritter’s hometown.” Ritter is an alumnus of the League of American Orchestras’ Executive Leadership and Institutional Vision programs. “Ritter connected readily to Mercury’s entrepreneurial spirit.… Mercury’s vision is to grow its budget by 50 percent in three years and attract that many more listeners, a goal that’s part of a larger scheme that included a rebranding campaign that saw baroque dropped from the troupe’s original name. Mercury Baroque morphed into Mercury – The Orchestra Redefined to expand the scope of its raison d’être.”
Posted August 7, 2013
