Symphony Center remains the place to be for special events, as well as concerts

From September through June, Symphony Center hosts some kind of an event virtually every day. “It’s almost constant, except for that week of year-end holidays,” said Joe Sherman, one of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s two production managers.

Many of these events are well-publicized, such as CSO and Civic Orchestra of Chicago concerts, educational offerings via the CSO’s Negaunee Music Institute and jazz, chamber-music and other performances of Symphony Center Presents, the CSO’s presenting arm.

But others are rentals that, aside from the occasional outside concert bookings, happen out of public view. These events consist of everything from corporate annual meetings and high-school music festivals to weddings and Chicago Public Schools gatherings.

The only time when the landmark building, built in 1904 and designed by Daniel Burnham, is largely quiet is July and August, when the CSO is in residency at the Ravinia Festival in Highland Park, and other in-house concerts are not routinely scheduled.

“Events are definitely a seasonal thing, except for weddings,” Sherman said. “And we usually don’t present any [CSO or SCP] concerts in the summer, and we don’t get as many rental concerts in the summer because there are just so many offerings in the city.”

Sherman serves as the production manager for Symphony Center Presents, which encompasses piano, chamber music, jazz and visiting-orchestra series, and for all of Symphony Center’s rental events. Jeffrey Stang serves as production manager for CSO events, including the main subscription and MusicNOW series.

As noted, rental events at Symphony Center are wide-ranging, starting with weddings, which usually take place in Grainger Ballroom, an elegant, French Renaissance-style space on the second floor. Because it is sometimes used for pre-concert talks and is also open to the public during concerts, it is  available only about 10 weeks a year for weddings, which limits its use for that purpose. Nonetheless, eight to 10 such ceremonies typically are held there each year.

What Sherman called the “bread and butter” of Symphony Center rentals are high-school and college music festivals and other kinds of student concerts such as Suzuki recitals. Many of these rentals occur in March and April, with Sherman and his colleagues carefully fitting them into available time slots.

Some of these events are set up by travel agents, such as Brightspark, Music Celebrations International and Music Travel Consultants, which coordinate with out-of-town school groups. Chicago-area student ensembles — bands, orchestras and choirs — tend to book the hall directly, sometimes with three high schools joining forces and splitting the rental fee.

These groups typically get on stage for rehearsal and later for a performance, what Sherman described as an awesome experience” for students and their families. “Almost every time we have those events, we have parents of those kids coming up saying that they had an opportunity to do something like this when they were kid, and it stayed with them their whole life,” he said. “So it’s really neat to be able to do that.”

Other outside events at Symphony Center consist of annual meetings and other corporate convocations, as well as ones organized by the Chicago Public Schools, including gatherings of principals and other administrators.

Rentals to professional performance groups such as rock bands or touring theatrical companies are rare because of the relative inflexibility of Symphony Center’s main venue, Orchestra Hall. Originally designed as a concert hall, it does not have a fly space or other stage attributes like a built-in light booth. “It’s not necessarily the most flexible hall because of when it was built and what it was made for,” he said. “So as magical as a place that is, it is limited.”

That said, occasional rentals to outside concert promoters do occur; for instance, Chicago-based Jam Productions presented two performances by satirical pop singer Weird Al Yankovic in July. Another example is Sinatra-style crooner Harry Connick Jr., featured in back-to-back concerts in Symphony Center a few summers ago.

But whatever the occasion, Symphony Center remains the place to be. “It’s an amazing hall,” Sherman said. “The variety of presentations we are able to pull off, and with such limited time, is a testament to the incredible abilities of our stage crew.”