Don Reinhold onstage with Board Chair Ebony S. Clemons at his final concert as CEO of the Wichita Symphony Orchestra in April. Photo by Gavin Peters Photography.
In Sunday’s Wichita Eagle (8/25), David Burke writes, “Don Reinhold prefers to be behind the scenes. The CEO of the Wichita Symphony Orchestra reluctantly spoke to the audience at the final concert of the 2023-24 season to thank them, for which he received a standing ovation…. Reinhold … retires from his position at the symphony after 12 years at the end of the month…. Daniel Hege, conductor and music director of the WSO, has known Reinhold since about 1997, when Hege was with the Baltimore Symphony and Reinhold was in charge of the National Orchestral Institute at the University of Maryland. [Reinhold had also been executive director of California’s Fresno Philharmonic.] … Reinhold arrived mid-recession in 2012 to find the [Wichita] symphony finances in dire straits…. The symphony’s endowment fund, he said, went from $3.5 million in 2012 to ‘just shy of $9 million’ at his departure…. Besides righting the economic ship of the orchestra, Hege said, Reinhold improved the ticketing system for the WSO and brought it online, to make it more efficient, track more information and become more customer friendly…. Ebony S. Clemons, chair of the WSO board … said, ‘One of the many qualities that I admire about Don is that he has a skill set that artfully marries strategy, repertoire, network and community.’ ”
