Episode 9. League of American Orchestra's Simon Woods: Cultural Leadership and the Contemporary American Orchestra

This week Sam spoke to Simon Woods, President and CEO of the League of American Orchestras. Simon has led an ambitious change agenda for American orchestras, particularly in the areas of diversity and inclusion - an area which he is personally very passionate about. Simon talks about the League’s work with its (over) 650 member orchestras and some of the incredible programs and initiatives currently happening in orchestras. He discusses the changing face of leadership and governance and how orchestras contributed to and participated in the debate about some of the burning social issues of recent years: Black Lives Matter, the Me Too movement, and the current geopolitical conflicts in the world.  Links:League of American Orchestrashttps://americanorchestras.org/Symphony https://symphony.org/about-symphony/Simon’s Medium pagehttps://simonwds.medium.com/Seattle Symphony connects with city’s homeless populationhttps://symphony.org/seattle-symphony-connects-with-citys-homeless-population/Chicago Symphony Orchestra: Notes for Peace programhttps://cso.org/performances/22-23/civic-orchestra/notes-for-peace/#:~:text=Notes%20for%20Peace%20is%20an,create%20original%20songs%20of%20tribute.The Art of Relevance, Nina Simonhttps://artofrelevance.org/Connect with Decoding Cultural Leadership on social mediaInstagram, Threads, X/Twitter:@[email protected]@samuelcairnduffRead Sam's Substack here.Presenter and research: Sam CairnduffCreative Director: Niloofar PashmforooshPresented in association with LimelightDecoding Cultural Leadership | Culture. Society. Conversations