Make Music More

The SSO is thrilled to have the support of the Frank and Ellen Remai Foundation – this season, donations up to $300,000 to the SSO are matched by the Foundation.

Music plays an integral role in everyone’s lives. Whether the distraction on your commute, the beat that causes spontaneous dancing with friends, the tune that reminds you of that first kiss, the exhilarating backdrop of your favourite movie, or your orchestra in full flight – the musical soundtrack of our lives is what makes life worth living.

Over the last few years, the SSO has been leaning into our mission statement: the Saskatoon Symphony Orchestra shares the joy, hope, and community of making music. Against all odds, we’ve been able to keep your SSO growing and sharing our music with you in the hall and hundreds of thousands of people online. There is much to celebrate!

But now it is time to turn our attention to ensuring a robust future for your SSO.

Opus 100: Share in the Future

With only 8 years until our 100th anniversary season, it’s time to turn our attention to achieving the goals we set out in our Opus 100 strategic plan.

We’re thrilled to announce the next phase of support for the SSO, Opus 100: Share in the Future is a matching gift fundraising campaign with a goal of $500,000- the Remai Foundation is again generously stepping up to match your donations this season up to $300,000.

For us to keep our community of music growing, we’ll need to rely on the generosity of our supporters to help us maneuver through our next season. The impact the pandemic has had on concerts is truly remarkable, and while our new ConcertStream.tv will allow more people to access  SSO concerts it does not generate the same revenues that we’d normally see from ticket sales.

The SSO has seen an era of remarkable organizational health thanks to the support of its donors and patrons. And ConcertStream.tv has connected the SSO with thousands of patrons, old and new, all around the globe!

Reaching this goal is paramount to ensuring the SSO can continue to:

• grow our programming
• invest in our musicians and staffing
• commission new works and create unique one-of-a-kind concert experiences
• launching educational programming in partnership with Carnegie Hall
• new music education and wellness initiatives
• take on the significant work to help us achieve our Opus 100 goals

We know how much the SSO means to you, and we’re so grateful for the support our donors have given us to get through the pandemic.

The SSO has been focusing on the joy that music gives us. The pandemic has given the SSO many opportunities to be creative and lean into the challenges – but the pandemic has also meant that audiences aren’t quite ready to return to their seats in pre-pandemic numbers. This poses a challenge to the SSO, as we generally realize 40% of our revenues from ticket sales.

You can help support this very special initiative

Educational Partnership with the Carnegie Hall Foundation

The SSO is a partner orchestra with Carnegie Hall’s Link Up programming – this is an incredible opportunity for students in central and northern Saskatchewan. In 2020 we had to cancel our first year of Link Up, and we’re thrilled to bring it back and offer this programming to classrooms across our city and region.

Your donation to this project helps the SSO hire a Link Up Coordinator and cover costs to keep the programming free for schools/classrooms.

To make a gift to these initiatives you can select to direct your donation in the drop down menu when giving online or let us know when making your donation over the phone or in person.

We’re incredibly proud of what we achieved during the deep challenges of the last two years, including keeping our musicians and staff working through the entire pandemic. We’re excited that we can share our streaming platform with many arts organizations in Saskatchewan.

Your gift to the SSO supports

• our performances and our performers
• continuing to grow the SSO and strengthen our community partnerships
• expanding of our online offerings to increase accessibility to our concerts
• our educational programming for youth
• our outreach programs like our online classes and performances for seniors
• preparing to take the orchestra through to its 100th anniversary season – ambitious plans and growth are needed to make the SSO vitalized for the future

Our goal is to ensure that our musicians, our patrons, and our community have a strong vibrant organization for generations to come.

The SSO has grown strong through some very difficult times in the past, and we can’t wait to see what the future has in score!

Click here to find out more about the SSO’s ten year plan Opus 100

All donations of $30 or more will receive a tax receipt for the gift value. Tax receipts are emailed to patrons – if you have misplaced a receipt, please reach out to the SSO for a quick replacement of the receipt.