Advertising, Best Practices, Arts Management, Brand Values, Business of Opera, Business Partnership, Business Development, C-Suite, Corporate Governance, San Francisco, Technology James Mowdy Advertising, Best Practices, Arts Management, Brand Values, Business of Opera, Business Partnership, Business Development, C-Suite, Corporate Governance, San Francisco, Technology James Mowdy

San Francisco Symphony CEO and Board Chair: Please repair your brand or resign

(San Francisco, CA) - Esa-Pekka Salonen’s announced 2025 departure from San Francisco Symphony still stuns, even several months on. With this piece, OI aims to:

  • Explore the known why behind the financial crisis

  • Explain why we oppose the company’s devastating, short-sighted cuts

  • Provide guidance on how this legacy brand could begin repairing its self-inflicted wounds

Given his stature as the Bay Area’s classical music journalist, we first relied on San Francisco Chronicle’s Joshua Kosman and his reporting. Kosman’s first piece laid out the situation, Salonen’s terse statement, SFS musicians’ vocal support of their Maestro, as well as their demand for audited financials from CEO Mark Spivey and Board Chair Priscilla Geeslin...

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