The Audience Outlook Monitor (AOM) is a longitudinal tracking study to keep tabs on arts attendees’ thoughts, concerns, and intentions about returning to live events. Organized by the arts consulting firm, WolfBrown, the first phase of the study ran from May to December 2020, and included a number of orchestras. For the second phase of the study in 2021, WolfBrown forged a partnership with the League of American Orchestras to broaden the pool of participating orchestras while also creating a set of resources for the larger orchestra field.
Beginning in February 2021, a cohort of 15 orchestras began surveying their patrons, either monthly or bi-monthly, depending on the size of their customer database. The surveying will continue through November. Participating orchestras access their results via WolfBrown’s dashboard and share results with each other. The 15 orchestras also generously agreed to share aggregated results with the larger orchestra field through a special dashboard created specifically for League members. WolfBrown will support field learning through periodic webinars, quarterly video briefings specifically for the orchestra field, and monthly summaries of key findings (“research notes”).
The 15 orchestras constituting the national orchestra cohort are:
- The Cleveland Orchestra
- Detroit Symphony Orchestra
- Los Angeles Philharmonic
- Madison Symphony Orchestra
- Nashville Symphony
- New World Symphony
- New York Philharmonic
- North Carolina Symphony
- Omaha Symphony
- Oregon Symphony
- Pacific Symphony
- Philadelphia Orchestra
- San Diego Symphony
- San Francisco Symphony
- Tucson Symphony Orchestra
We are grateful to these orchestras for making the cohort possible, and especially to the thousands of patrons who take time out of their busy schedules to complete the survey. Without them, none of this would be possible.
