About Minnesota Orchestra
The Minnesota Orchestra is an American orchestra based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Founded originally as the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra in 1903, the Minnesota Orchestra plays most of its concerts at Minneapolis's Orchestra Hall.
The eighth major orchestra established in the United States, the Minnesota Orchestra was founded by Emil Oberhoffer as the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra in 1903. It gave its first performance on November 5, 1903, in Minneapolis's Exposition Building. In 1911, it began a series of children's concerts under the sponsorship of the Young People's Symphony Concert Association , which continues to this day. Early in the 1920s, the orchestra was one of the first to be heard on recordings and on the radio, playing a nationally broadcast concert with guest conductor Bruno Walter in 1923. In 1968, the orchestra changed its name to the Minnesota Orchestra. It makes its home in downtown Minneapolis's Orchestra Hall, which was built for the ensemble in 1974. The orchestra's previous hall, starting in 1929, was Northrop Memorial Auditorium on the University of Minnesota's Minneapolis campus.
In 2007 the Minnesota Orchestra's assets began declining, a trend exacerbated by the financial crisis of 2007–2008. In August 2008, the Minnesota Orchestra Association's invested assets totaled $168.5 million, 13% less than the $192.4 million the Association had projected in its 2007 Strategic Plan. In fiscal year 2009, the Minnesota Orchestra's board "sold $28.7 million in securities at a nearly $14 million loss".
During 2009 and 2010, the orchestra's board reported a balanced budget and drew on its endowment to cover operational deficits. At the time, it was trying to secure $16 million in state bonding for renovations of Orchestra Hall and Peavey Plaza. The orchestra posted operational deficits of $2.9 million in 2011 and $6 million in 2012.
On October 1, 2012, the Minnesota Orchestral Association locked out the orchestra's musicians and canceled concerts through November 18 after failing to reach a new collective bargaining agreement. The MOA stated that spending on musician salaries and benefits was depleting the organization's endowment, and that labor costs needed to be reduced by $5 million per year. The musicians and their union took the position that the proposed cuts were so deep and draconian as to represent an existential threat to the future of the orchestra.
The entire 2012–13 concert season was canceled. During the lockout, the musicians periodically presented concerts on their own, In December 2012, Musical Director Osmo Vänskä sent a letter to the board of directors and the musicians warning that the lockout was causing severe damage to the orchestra's reputation at home and abroad. On April 30, 2013, Vänskä stated he would resign if the lockout continued:
After the orchestra management cancelled the concerts in question, Vänskä resigned as music director on 1 October 2013 with immediate effect. On October 4 and 5, Vänskä conducted three final concerts with the locked-out orchestra at the University of Minnesota's Ted Mann Concert Hall, with Emanuel Ax as the guest pianist. As an encore, Vänskä conducted Sibelius's Valse Triste, where he requested that the audience withhold its applause afterward.
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