The Chicago Symphony Orchestra Association on Tuesday announced that it had received a donation of $50 million from benefactors Helen and Sam Zell on behalf of the Zell Family Foundation, with the money planned for the long-term financial health of the orchestra.
According to the announcement, the money will “allow the CSOA to continue to advance its strategic goals.” Among those goals are reducing the CSOA’s debt, increasing its endowment and funding musician and staff retirement benefits. The donation will also help support the orchestra’s domestic and international touring, pay for marketing initiatives and go to “special artistic projects shaped by CSO music directors.”
The CSOA, the association that manages the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, told members of the orchestra and its board of trustees of the gift earlier Tuesday.
In its announcement, the CSOA called the donation “transformational” for the orchestra, and said it was part of an ongoing Sempre Always capital campaign established in 2020 and chaired by Helen Zell. The gift brings the current total raised to $215 million.
Helen Zell, a longtime arts philanthropist in Chicago, is the wife of the late Sam Zell, a real estate investor who at one time was the owner of the Chicago Tribune and other newspapers.
Her contribution to Steppenwolf Theatre’s campus expansion prompted the theater to officially name its new in-the-round stage the Ensemble Theater in Honor of Helen Zell. Similarly, the official designation of the CSO’s music director position is Zell Music Director, after a $17 million gift from the Zell Foundation in 2014 that was part of what was then the largest donation in the CSOA’s history.
Helen Zell’s roles with the CSOA began in 2007 as a member of the Board of Trustees; she became the first woman CSOA board chair with two consecutive three-year terms between 2015 and 2020 and remains a board member, and served as chair of the CSOA music director search committee that recommended the appointment of Klaus Mäkelä as the CSO’s 11th music director in April 2024.
dgeorge@chicagotribune.com