This week, we’ve had reports from two member orchestras about their Annual General Meetings – opportunities to report on their financial, artistic and community activities in 2008-09.  Here’s what we learned!

Manitoba Chamber Orchestra
Fresh from their western Canada tour with Dame Evelyn Glennie, the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra held its AGM on September 30 and led off with the welcome news of its thirteenth consecutive operating surplus on the 2008-09 season.  Paid attendance was 4,208 for the MCO’s nine-concert series in Westminster United Church, with twice that number hearing the MCO in concert on tour in northern Manitoba, across the country and in the United States.  The biggest news of the season, though, was the November appointment of Music Director and Conductor, Anne Manson.  New and newish Canadian music on the season included works by John Estacio, Michael Oesterle and Malcolm Forsyth, and commissioned pieces by Oesterle and Jim Hiscott.  Education was also highlighted, with many hundreds of Winnipeg school children hearing the MCO live in Westminster Church every season; as well, a roving troupe of MCO musicians visited communities in rural Manitoba as part of the Frontier School Division’s Fiddle Program.  The MCO Endowment Fund, administered by The Winnipeg Foundation, continued to grow: in 07/08 the fund held its own, and is now valued at $1.24 million.

Symphony Nova Scotia
Symphony Nova Scotia held its Annual General Meeting recently, and the Halifax-based orchestra also had good news to report.  Highlights included a surplus of $18,500 on revenues of $3.445 million and ticket sales revenues totaling $778,000 – an increase of 8% over the previous year.  Private sector revenues were also up 8% over the previous year.  As well, the Symphony Nova Scotia Foundation reported that its holdings totaled $3.1 million in August, and that the Foundation is on track to reach its $5.5 million goal by the end of 2010.