“Patricia Mitchell, who led an expansion of the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts while bringing calm, stability and wit to a once-fractious venue, announced Thursday that she will retire as president and CEO,” writes Rohan Preston in Friday’s (5/29) Star Tribune (Minneapolis). The Ordway is the home of the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra and other performing arts groups. “Mitchell, who has served since 2007 as the St. Paul multi-arts center’s president and CEO, turns 68 in August. She will stay until December while the board conducts a national search for her replacement. She leaves a legacy both as peacemaker and builder. In February, the Ordway opened a 1,100-seat, $42 million concert hall that was greeted with plaudits.… Serving as principal home of the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, it complements an adjoining 1,900-seat theater where operas, musicals and major stage shows are presented.” The hall was a “joint effort by the Ordway and its three ‘arts partners’—the SPCO, Schubert Club and Minnesota Opera…. [Mitchell] has held executive posts at the San Francisco Opera, the Los Angeles Opera, the Hollywood Bowl and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, where she was instrumental in the building of Disney Concert Hall.”
Posted June 1, 2015
