North Port Symphony celebrates 40 years with fundraising gala

North Port Symphony is made up of 65 volunteer musicians, including advanced amateurs, some professionals and advanced local high school students. MICHAEL ALEGRIA / COURTESY PHOTO

Music education is especially close to the heart of North Port Symphony Executive Director Michael Alegria.

“When I was 12, I had just gotten my flute,” he remembered. “I was learning to play and practicing hard to show my mother as soon as she came home from heart bypass surgery.”

His mom never came home.

Alegria grew up in North Port raised by his widower father, a hardworking Mexican immigrant, and had to travel all the way to Bradenton — under a church ladies’ guild sponsorship — for the nearest flute lessons.

“Music became my happy place,” he said. “It became where I found my sense of belonging throughout school. That’s what it means to a lot of kids. We need these resources for our students here in North Port.”

A small nonprofit, earning less than $100,000 in revenue each season, North Port Symphony is dedicated to a mission of “sharing the joy of music” through education and community outreach, in part through offering $13,000 in music scholarships to local students over the last five years.

Former North Port Commissioner Jill Luke takes the podium as special guest conductor for a 2021 North Port Symphony performance of Sousa’s “Stars and Stripes Forever.” She will also assist at the Ruby Gala’s live auction. MICHAEL ALEGRIA / COURTESY PHOTO

Its long-term goals include launching an affordable Strings Summer Camp for North Port’s fourth through sixth graders, developing an afterschool stringed instrument program for North Port students, and producing free public performances from North Port City Hall to Wellen Park.

From a handful of local residents who began playing together for pleasure in 1983, the symphony has grown into an all-volunteer orchestra of advanced amateurs, professionals from as far away as Tampa, and a dozen advanced local high school students, all under the baton of Music Director and Principal Conductor Robert Romanski.

It now performs five Sunday afternoon concerts each season at the Performing Arts Center at North Port High School.

“We’re an orchestra for the community, by the community, presenting pop/classical programs that the audience will enjoy,” Alegria said. “Even though our Sunday afternoon concerts sell out regularly, and we’ve been around for 40 years, we still hear that people didn’t know we existed. So, we’ve made a huge effort to increase our visibility.”

As part of that effort — and in celebration of this year’s 40th ruby anniversary — the symphony will soon host its first-ever fundraising gala, with dinner, dancing, and live and silent auctions.

Donations will help the symphony achieve its goal of supporting music programs for North Port’s youth.

Volunteer auctioneer North Port Fire Department Lt. Richard Yarnell, assisted by former City Commissioner Jill Luke, will call live-auction items, including a homecooked dinner prepared by Romanski; a custom-made trombone floor lamp; an Artistic Symphony Quilt; a studio portrait by Rob Hurth Photography; a week at a resort in Riviera Maya or Nuevo Nayarit-Vallarta, Mexico; and an original Kitt Moran oil painting.

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