“The Nashville Symphony cut its operating loss to $2.4 million in fiscal year 2014, down from $11 million the year prior, according to an annual audit,” writes E.J. Boyer in Monday’s (3/16) Nashville Business Journal. “The loss—an improvement of 78 percent—comes just one year after the symphony avoided bankruptcy and a foreclosure sale on its Schermerhorn Symphony Center by striking a favorable debt-restructuring deal at the final hour…. ‘We’ve made tremendous progress, quite dramatic progress, actually,’ said symphony CEO Alan Valentine…. Symphony CFO Chad Boyd, who was hired in early 2014, said the organization’s focus has been to reduce that operating loss.… The symphony … continued to cut expenses in fiscal year 2014, including $1 million in salary expense, due to across-the-board cuts at the administration and musician level, and $900,000 in general operating expenses. (Musician wages were since reinstated slightly under a four-year deal reached last fall). But looking ahead, Valentine said cost-cutting will be less drastic…. Valentine noted that morale … is improved, and donors are beginning to ask less about the financials and more about the programming, which to him, signifies a turning of the tide…. ‘The future of the symphony looks bright,’ he said.”
Posted March 23, 2015
