In Thursday’s (6/12) Chicago Business Journal, Lewis Lazare writes that the Chicago Symphony Orchestra has received two contributions totaling $32 million, representing the two largest gifts in the orchestra’s history. “Helen and Sam Zell, who head the Chicago-based Zell Family Foundation, have made a $17 million contribution to the Symphony’s endowment and general operating funds.… Sam Zell is the well-known Chicago real estate mogul and businessman who owned the Tribune Co.… His wife, Helen Zell, has been a member of the CSO’s Board of Trustees since 2007. A second gift of $15 million is being made by the Chicago-based Negaunee Foundation to support the work of the Chicago Symphony’s Institute for Learning, Access and Training, which will be known going forward as the Negaunee Music Institute at the Chicago Symphony. The Institute was established as the education and community outreach arm of the CSO.” The article notes that the announcement of the gifts comes just prior to CSO President Deborah Rutter’s departure to become president of the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C., adding a “major exclamation mark to what has been perceived as her successful tenure as leader of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.”
Posted June 13, 2014
