January 24th, 1968, 47 years-ago today, the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra played its first concert at its new home, Powell Hall. The building now known as Powell Symphony Hall was erected in 1925 as the St. Louis Theater, a vaudeville house. As part of the Orpheum chain, it was foreclosed & sold when their parent company, Radio-Keith- Orpheum (RKO) went into receivership in January 1933. Harry, Sam, & Nat Koplar held a $710,000 mortgage on the building, & reopened it as a movie theater the following November. Closing in 1966, it seems appropriate that The Sound of Music was the last movie shown in the old theater. Acquired by the St. Louis Symphony Society in 1966, Powell Hall is named for Walter S. Powell, a St. Louis shoe manufacturing executive whose widow, Helen Lamb Powell, made the Symphony Society beneficiary of a $1 million charitable trust. These funds helped to match a $2 million Ford Foundation grant for the endowment of the new concert hall. Founded in 1880 by Joseph Otten as the St. Louis Choral Society, the St. Louis Symphony is the second-oldest symphony orchestra in the United States. The Choral Society first performed in the auditorium of the St. Louis Mercantile Library at Locust and Broadway in Downtown St. Louis, & before moving to Powell Hall it performed for many years at the Kiel Opera House. The St. Louis Symphony has recorded for the Columbia, RCA Victor, Red Seal, Telarc, Vox/Turnabout and Angel EMI labels. It has also issued CD recordings on its own label, Arch Media, and has received six Grammy Awards and fifty-six nominations.
Posted on: Sat, 24 Jan 2015 06:04:17 +0000
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