Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra

Since its inception in 1912, the Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra (FWSO) has served as the city’s cultural touchstone—connecting members of the artistic community through meaningful artistic collaborations and high-quality performances. Today, the FWSO is a robust artistic organization with a 46-week long concert season, 70 full-time professional musicians, and an annual operating budget surpassing $15M.

Every year, the FWSO performs a full concert season as the principal resident company of Bass Performance Hall. The FWSO’s concert season consists of a Symphonic Series, a Pops Series, a Family Series, a Chamber Series, and Concerts in the Garden—the FWSO’s annual outdoor summer music festival performed at the Fort Worth Botanic Garden in partnership with the Botanical Research Institute of Texas (BRIT). Additionally, the FWSO regularly plays educational concerts and engages in community outreach performances throughout North Texas, in order to bring the gift of music to all members of our community.

As the only professional symphony orchestra in Tarrant County, the FWSO strives to provide numerous unique programmatic offerings to reflect the diversity of the populations the organization serves. The FWSO strives to be purposefully inclusive, rather than accidentally exclusive—which is achieved through strategic decision making processes that take into account the voices, opinions, and expertise of community representatives external to the organization. The FWSO works especially closely with the Fort Worth Independent School District (FWISD), a historically underserved school district in which 85% of students are considered economically disadvantaged. The FWSO works with FWISD to provide supplementary music education programs and teacher resources through the FWSO’s Adventures in Music (AIM) initiative.

Adventures in Music is a comprehensive suite of music-based educational programs designed to align with the Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) state standards for public school students in grades K-12. Additionally, AIM programs are designed to build upon one another as students progress through their schooling. Structuring the AIM initiative in this way benefits the students, who have the opportunity to engage with the FWSO multiple times during elementary, middle, and high school, therefore compounding the knowledge and skills they gain through engaging with the FWSO’s education programs.