Seattle Symphony Maxing Out Mom's Credit Card

The Seattle Times tries to put a happy face on the news that the Seattle Symphony is projecting an accumulated $5.5 million deficit by pointing out that ticket sales are up. But the troubling fact remains that over the past three years the deficit has grown from $1 million, to $3.2 million, to $5.5 million. For an annual budget of around $21 million, a deficit of $5.5 million is remarkable.

It's true that the Symphony has an endowment of about $30 million, but endowment principal can't be raided for emergencies, and again, the issue is that the bleeding keeps getting worse. Delightfully, the Times points out that the blame lies with Seattle philanthropists:

Among many contributing factors: a three-year, $5 million gift from the Charles Simonyi Fund for the Arts and Sciences has run out (the Simonyi Fund gave the orchestra $2 million for 2003-04 and also for 2004-05, and last year gave $1 million). Other donors have not stepped forward with equivalent largesse.

For the record, the Simonyi Fund made a $10 million gift total, but $5 million went to the Symphony's endowment and $5 million to the annual fund. It's almost as if donors were preferring to give to the endowment knowing that the Symphony can't use the funds for gas and groceries.

Add in the long-running running feud between the conductor, Gerard Schwarz, and a claque of musicians, the Board's dysfunctional split between friends of Schwarz and the-not-so-friendly, an exodus of top management, and a new executive director who looks hand-picked by Schwarz, and you might start to wonder if there isn't some truth to that line about insanity defined as doing the same thing over and over, but expecting different results. Maybe it's time to schedule an interview with these people.