- December 13, 2025
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Musicians throughout Florida have had to take their final bow in recent months as two major community orchestras ceased operations.
But that doesn't mean the curtain has closed for amateur and semi-professional classical musicians.
Some community orchestras have seen a resurgence in attendance and donations ever since the Punta Gorda Symphony shuttered last year and the Southwest Florida Symphony, based in Fort Myers, closed at the end of its fiscal year in June.
The Naples Community Orchestra is one of those in the resurgence category.
“We’ve been very fortunate to have the audience we have in Southwest Florida,” says Alvin Ho, Artistic Director and Conductor of the Naples Community Orchestra. “And now that other orchestras have closed we’ve seen people come from Fort Myers and these other markets so the audience is still here.”
The Naples Community Orchestra, comprised of 55 volunteer musicians, says last spring was the most successful season in its 32-year history. The orchestra saw a 162% increase in ticket sales, from nearly $29,400 to more than $77,600, and a 21% increase in donations, from almost $107,400 to nearly $128,900. During the 2020 season, the NCO made $35,400 in ticket sales and raised just under $94,700 in donations.
“There's definitely a market here, with the number of people moving into this area — you just got to go find them,” says board member and clarinet player Joe Duffy.
The Naples Community Orchestra managed to avoid the pitfalls that plagued the other shuttered sister symphonies.
Both of those orchestras cited dwindling attendance and donations, as well as setbacks during the pandemic. In some cases there are claims of mismanagement and infighting between musicians and orchestra leadership. And the Southwest Florida Symphony cites Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ veto of all $32 million in Florida arts grants as another setback.
But community interest in the arts and interests in classical music are still alive and well, contends Duffy.
Other groups like the Sarasota Orchestra, the Naples Philharmonic and the Pops Orchestra of Bradenton and Sarasota have also reported increased attendance.
One organization — the Sarasota Orchestra — is even panning a major expansion: The project, dubbed the Music Center, is on a 32-acre site at 5701 Fruitville Road, just west of Interstate 75 and is estimated to cost $375 million to $425 million. It recently received a $50 million boost toward a capital campaign for the project.
Expected to open in the 2029-30 season, the Sarasota Orchestra Music Center is under design to include a flexible-use performance space, multiple rehearsal and practice rooms and native landscaping for a park-like setting. The facilities will add capacity for Sarasota Orchestra and other regional performing arts organizations that are challenged to secure performance and rehearsal dates.
"This anonymous donor felt that it was important to make a statement that this vision should go forward and that they have a lot of confidence and credibility in the organization," Sarasota Orchestra President and CEO Joe McKenna told yourobserver.com, sister publication of the Business Observer. "A gift of this size and scope is a really powerful statement about our community, about our organization and about the belief in the future for what we will provide to the region.”
Strong community support like is what other orchestra leaders cite as the backbone of their organizations — even those previously struggling to stay alive.
In Charlotte County, the community interest was strong enough for a new orchestra to emerge from the remnants of the now-defunct Punta Gorda Symphony — the new Florida Philharmonic.
That group's first concert, on Memorial Day 2024, came four months after the Punta Gorda Symphony went out of business, filling its 250 seat venue. The new philharmonic typically boasts 15 to 25 musicians, much smaller than its predecessor's 70-plus members — a decision made intentionally to keep costs down. The orchestra also now performs in a more affordable venue, the 650-seat Burnt Store Presbyterian Church, compared to the Punta Gorda Symphony's former home at the Charlotte Performing Arts Center. It's a smaller footprint than before, but its enough to keep the audience engaged and filling seats, leadership says.
Key to these orchestras success is connecting to audiences and continuing to put on a good show, officials with the organizations say.
“We have been incredibly fortunate to not only attract and feature some of the best talent available but also enjoy the generous and enthusiastic support of our fans and community as a whole,” says Ho, with the Naples Community Orchestra. “The Orchestra has cultivated a vital two-way relationship with its audience—listening closely to their voices in order to shape concerts, programs and entire seasons that inspire and excite. It’s a winning formula.”
For the NCO, that meant adding a backyard reception to its concerts where audience members can meet and mingle with musicians, a new social media branding strategy and bringing in guests musicians at the top of their field to play with the orchestra.
The Pops Orchestra of Bradenton and Sarasota, meanwhile, found its formula to success by changing up its setlist says conductor Robyn Bell.
When Bell became the group's conductor in 2011, the Pops Orchestra was about to close its doors, she says. An average of 250 people would attend concerts and the group's annual budget was around $80,000.Yet the group has survived to see its 50th season, she says, thanks to clever programming cultivated from direct feedback from its audience.
Bell has found a niche in hiring tribute artists for popular musicians like Elton John or The Beatles to come play the hits with the Pops Orchestra and turning traditional Veterans Day concerts into theme concerts like Rhinestone Cowboys and National Heroes, with popular country songs preceding the traditional patriotic salutes.
Now, the group has gone from doing one performance of each concert series to three sold-out performances each season. Audiences have ballooned to roughly 3,000 per concert series and the group is able to sustain its model on roughly 70% ticket sales.
"I kind of joke that if it doesn't have a drum set, we don't play it," Bell says. "We send out surveys asking, 'What do you want to hear? What do you like?' I kind of stay in tune with what's popular, what I think our particular crowd likes and what we find is they really like music they can tap their foot to."
