Resident orchestra gets a new name
The orchestra that plays in the pit for Opera San Antonio and Ballet San Antonio performances has a new name.
Classical Music Institute, which pulls the orchestra together for those performances as part of its programming, has dubbed the ensemble the Orchestra San Antonio. The name will first appear on programs for the opera’s staging of “The Pirates of Penzance” on Thursday and Saturday.
“That’s kind of our hidden debut, in a sense,” said CMI President and CEO Paul Montalvo.
The musicians previously performed as the CMI Orchestra.
Like the ballet and the opera, CMI has been one of the resident companies of the Tobin Center for the Performing Arts since it opened in 2014. CMI began providing music for the other companies after the San Antonio Symphony folded in 2022.
The symphony musicians formed the San Antonio Philharmonic, which currently performs mostly at First Baptist Church of San Antonio.
CMI’S role remains the same, said Mike Fresher, president and CEO of the Tobin Center.
“It really doesn’t change anything,” Fresher said. “I think it’s a natural evolution of what CMI was and what they’ve now become. They’ve been doing this for the better part of two years, being the orchestra in the pit for these resident companies. They’re putting a name on it.”
CMI also presents chamber music concerts and has a growing education program. Montalvo said renaming the Orchestra San Antonio is a way to distinguish that branch of CMI.
“When people think of CMI, they think of a school. It’s in the name — institute,” he said.
The name is a step toward bigger goals for the orchestra, including producing concerts in the H-E-B Performance Hall at the Tobin Center and at other venues around town. That is likely to begin in the spring of 2025, Montalvo said.
He envisions a core ensemble of 30 to 40 musicians. Additional musicians would be added as needed if a program calls for it. Auditions will be held later this year.
The organization is trying to proceed carefully in the interest of financial stability.
Musicians who play with the orchestra also will teach in CMI’S after-school education program, which launched in March with two musicians at Stafford Elementary School. As the orchestra grows, the program will expand to schools all over town.