Boston Symphony Orchestra President and CEO Mark Volpe at Symphony Hall in Boston. Photo by Josh Reynolds / Boston Globe
“Boston Symphony Orchestra President and CEO Mark Volpe plans to retire at the end of February 2021, the orchestra announced Wednesday,” writes Jeremy Eichler in Wednesday’s (1/22) Boston Globe. “Over the last 22 years, Volpe has worked with three music directors, significantly expanded the organization’s endowment, and opened a new four-building facility at Tanglewood…. Since his arrival in 1997, the BSO has raised $766 million, allowing it to triple its endowment [and double] its operating budget…. In March 2021, Barbara W. Hostetter will succeed Susan W. Paine as chair. Hostetter … will also oversee the BSO’s search for Volpe’s successor…. ‘In my time we acquired quite a bit of real estate around Symphony Hall,’ Volpe said, adding that the orchestra now owns the entire block of Huntington Avenue … The BSO may consider building ‘spaces where you can do different types of programming, and rethink our relationship with the surrounding area.’ That project, if it moves forward, will await the orchestra’s next president. Volpe has not announced his own future plans but says they may include spending time in Italy, where he has extended family, and ‘working with other cultural institutions, working on projects that go beyond the United States.’”
