The Virginia Symphony Orchestra is an American regional orchestra in the Hampton Roads metro area. The orchestra performs at several venues in Virginia, including Chrysler Hall in Norfolk and the Ferguson Center for the Arts in Newport News.
The orchestra was founded in 1920 as the Norfolk Symphony, and was for a time the only American orchestra between Baltimore and Atlanta. During the US economic crisis and recession of the 1970s, the Virginia Symphony assumed its present form in 1979 with the merger of the Norfolk Symphony, Peninsula Symphony Orchestra, and the Virginia Beach Pops Symphony.
Past music directors of the orchestra have included Henry Cowles Whitehead, Edgar Schenckman and Russell Stanger. In May 1991, JoAnn Falletta was appointed the orchestra’s eleventh music director.
Read more about Virginia Symphony Orchestra: Music Directors (partial List)
Famous quotes containing the words symphony and/or orchestra:
“The truth is, as every one knows, that the great artists of the world are never Puritans, and seldom even ordinarily respectable. No virtuous man—that is, virtuous in the Y.M.C.A. sense—has ever painted a picture worth looking at, or written a symphony worth hearing, or a book worth reading, and it is highly improbable that the thing has ever been done by a virtuous woman.”
—H.L. (Henry Lewis)
““Pop” Wyman ruled here with a firm but gentle hand; no drunken man was ever served at the bar; no married man was allowed to play at the tables; across the face of the large clock was written “Please Don’t Swear,” and over the orchestra appeared the gentle admonition, “Don’t Shoot the Pianist—He’s Doing His Damndest.””
—Administration in the State of Colo, U.S. public relief program. Colorado: A Guide to the Highest State (The WPA Guide to Colorado)