Musicians of the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony in concert. Photo courtesy of the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony.
In Tuesday’s (9/19) CBC News (Canada), James Chaarani reports, “In the wake of the abrupt cancellation of its upcoming season, the Kitchener-Waterloo Symphony (KWS) says it is considering all options ‘up to and including insolvency.’ A statement sent out Tuesday afternoon said KWS would require around $2 million … to proceed with the 2023-24 season, and points to ‘an unprecedented rise in costs following the global pandemic’ as the reason. ‘Our hearts go out to the many people in our community who have been deeply affected by the cancellation of our season,’ said Rachel Smith-Spencer, Chair of the Board of Directors. The statement went on to say, ‘exhaustive efforts were made to secure additional support from governments, major donors, and past supporters’ and that the symphony is ‘open to immediate conversations with governments and other potential supporters about … funding.’… Cancellations include the Youth Orchestra and … a music program geared to low-income families…. Allene Chomyn, a violist with the KWS since 2007, first learned that the season was going to be cancelled on Saturday evening … ‘There was no writing on the wall,’ said the violist, who is also the union representative for the symphony [musicians] … ‘I was on the team that negotiated our collective agreement, which was ratified this summer, and we worked very closely with management on that and negotiations were good.’ ”
