Music to Our Ears

By Herb Hiller
Published: November 18, 2007
Last Updated On: December 12, 2011

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From orchestra to opera, Florida entertainment includes year 'round music performances and festivals spotlighting local and international luminaries.

The hills may be alive with music, but more than ever, so is flat Florida. It helps that musicians, same as music-lovers, love spending time here.


Florida Rings with Classical Music

Only in the mid-1900s did classical music fully find its way to Florida. In 1940, an opera society formed in Miami, followed post-World War II by the Palm Beach Opera and Tampa Bay's Florida Orchestra. Touring musicians began filling winter dates among them.

No surprise that classical music first struck a popular chord in Florida's wealthy population centers. An ear for music goes well with an eye for art and a palate for gourmet foods. "Patron of the arts" isn't just a fancy phrase for music lovers. All large performing companies need financial support beyond the box office and none more so than symphony orchestras, opera and ballet companies. Pavarotti may have overcome music's elite image but music itself still sidles up to wealth.


Miami's Sophisticated Music Scene

All of this established Miami with its endless sophistications (and its tourism wealth) as Florida's premier musical hub. Underwritten by Carnival Cruise Line founder Ted Arison and his wife Lyn, Miami's chief performing group is the leading training orchestra in America, the New World Symphony. Led by charismatic San Francisco Symphony conductor Michael Tilson Thomas, the New World Symphony prepares musicians typically in their early 20's for America's leading orchestras. Performances at the New World Center in Miami Beach range from symphonic works with their high-end tickets to chamber music programs that often feature modernist compositions and modest prices.

Southeast Florida is also home to the Miami International Piano Festival, which showcases pianists from around the world at halls in Miami and Fort Lauderdale. 

All around the state, musical organizations recognize the need to build audiences.

In Tune with Gulf Coast Florida

Like southeast Florida, the state's lower west coast has added new esteem in the musical arts to its reputation for sumptuous beach resorts. Drawing on the patronage of Naples' sophisticated retired CEOs, former advertising executive Myra Janco Daniels championed the building of Naples' architecturally distinguished Philharmonic Center for the Arts, followed by formation of Naples Philharmonic Orchestra to play "the Phil." The orchestra performs a nine-month season that often includes the Miami City Ballet and opera stars like Andrea Bocelli, Kiri Te Kanawa and Dmitri Hvorostovsky.

Just north, the Southwest Florida Symphony in Fort Myers performs a six-month season around Lee County. The Sarasota Opera, in its less-than-1,200-seat restored performance hall (located in one of the state's premier shopping districts) stages one fall and four winter operas from its repertory of more than 70.

Tampa Bay's Florida Orchestra have performed the entire Beethoven symphony cycle and works by Bartok, Britten, Honegger and Mahler - works that refute what only cynics might still regard as Florida's propensity to "dumb things down." Spurring high ticket demand among visitors as well as locals, TFO's performance venues in St. Petersburg, Clearwater and Tampa are all close to popular beach resorts and their cities' nighttime entertainment districts and restaurant rows.


Music for the Masses

All around the state, musical organizations recognize the need to build audiences. In mid-state Lakeland's fast-forward arts community, the Imperial Symphony Orchestra during Tea & Symphony programs prepares listeners for music scheduled each following week. 

The Jacksonville Symphony Orchestra at Jacoby Symphony Hall in Jacksonville's resurgent downtown starts younger. With support received from the Weaver Family Foundation, classical music programs reach 100,000 Duval County schoolchildren a year.

Universities year 'round nurture music and music lovers. Florida State University in Tallahassee, the state capital, has a music faculty of 90 (including Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Ellen Taafe Zwilich) that performs public programs. The University of Miami sponsors Festival Miami each spring in Miami and Fort Lauderdale that features the faculty-led Bergonzi String Quartet, its civic chorale, symphonic band, chamber symphony and symphony orchestra.

Central Florida Community College hosts the Ocala Symphony Orchestra at its Ocala campus in the midst of Florida horse country. The University of Florida brings international groups to arts-aware Gainesville, recently including the Jupiter String Quartet, Borealis String Quartet and BBC Concert Orchestra; all performances are open to the public, the same as student and faculty programs.


Small Towns, Big Sounds

Classical music isn't just a big city thing, and modern works now get heard from one end of the state to the other. Near Florida's sugar-sand beaches, the Pensacola Symphony Orchestra performs works by some of the greatest names in music.

Melbourne, Cocoa Beach and resort towns up and down the Space Coast host performances of the Community Band of Brevard and the 40-member Space Coast Flute Orchestra. Mount Dora's annual Music Festival set in central Florida's famed antiquing hub includes past performances by Gary Lewis, Music Makers and Florida Lakes Symphony Orchestra and Guy St. Clair.

Many performances are affordable. In addition to chamber programs of the New World Symphony, in any season you might hear a program by the Florida Atlantic University Wind Ensemble or Symphony Orchestra throughout the year, usually for free. Listeners at Bok Tower Gardens in Lake Wales can picnic under the trees (and nights, lie under the stars) while listening to carillon concerts for only the site's $12 entry fee. Mount Dora's classical programs are generally affordable, and many performances during the Amelia Island Chamber Music Festival are altogether free.