From November 12-14, 1971, the Association of Canadian Orchestras (ACO) held its first in-person Steering Committee Meeting in the board room at the Canada Council for the Arts in Ottawa. This meeting – at which the function and form of the new association were discussed and approved – was the culmination of many months of exploration and discussion; and by some measures, it was the official start of the movement now known as Orchestras Canada/Orchestres Canada.
In short: November 12th 2021 is (arguably) Orchestras Canada’s 50th anniversary! (Other important dates to remember? 1952, when a group of community orchestra leaders in Ontario first met to talk about common challenges; 1955, when the Ontario group met again and elected a steering committee; and 1964, when the nascent Ontario movement “was recognized…as the voice of Ontario community orchestras by the newly created Province of Ontario Council for the Arts.”) We salute these take-charge Ontarians: however, the national association’s founding clearly stems from the early 1970s and the leadership of such people as Jan Matejcek, Ezra Schabas, Robert Sunter, Ken Winters, Terence Wardrop, and Betty Webster.
To mark the occasion, we’d like to share the story of the founding of the Association of Canadian Orchestras, an entertaining and enlightening tale about our origins researched and written by the late Dorothy Beckel. Mrs. Beckel (1924 – 2021) was President of the Association of Canadian Orchestras, a founding member of the advisory council for Orchestras Canada, and a long-time supporter of orchestra music in every community she graced. She captured the momentum, personalities and major pre-occupations that led to the founding of ACO – and quite a tale it is.
Our favourite excerpt? It’s a quote from the redoubtable Helen M. Thompson, long-time head of the American Symphony Orchestra League, who came to talk to Canadian orchestra leaders about priorities and values as they began the critical work necessary to establish a national association for Canadian orchestras.
“If you have 41 symphony orchestras in Canada, be quite sure of this fact in all your operations on their behalf: 38 of those 41 are the most important ones. To be sure, the three at the top are your finest flower, but the 38 are the plant, and it is from them that everything stems: your new audience development; player development; symphonic-environment development. The fine flower at the top is immeasurably strengthened, beautified, insured, by a healthy and flourishing plant. It is a proof of experience that all orchestras are served by all audience development, player development and development of symphonic environment.
Every orchestra, large-budget or small budget, needs strength and stature in its own community. A function of an orchestral association is to assist in the attainment of these by doing things for the individual orchestra which the orchestra cannot do for itself”