Getting Ready for Opening Night

Have you ever heard the story about the stone masons working on a cathedral? You could say I work on budgets, or that I make sure the numbers add up, but I prefer to think that I’m helping “build a cathedral” – which in this case happens to be the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra. Work for the opening night begins months ahead of time. The Music Director creates the programming, the Operations and Production manager figures out what musicians are needed and what it will cost to produce it, the Box Office manager estimates what the ticket revenue will be, and the Development department figures out how much money we’ll need to raise to cover the shortfall (the price of your ticket only covers a part of what it actually costs to put on a performance). I take all that information, put it together, and help figure out if we can afford to do what we want to do. Sort of like your monthly budget, only bigger.

And here’s where it’s all done, my humble little “hoffice” (office in the hallway).

Not all accountants are neat freaks, you know!