Last week, the American Symphony Orchestra League — the national service and advocacy organization representing and linking nearly 1,000 symphony, chamber, youth and collegiate orchestras — officially took on its new identity: League of American Orchestras.
The name change has been accompanied by a new logo and graphics, a redesigned website (www.americanorchestras.org), a new tagline — "Engaging. Sustaining. Transforming." — and a revitalized mission.
This past summer the League completed a strategic plan, developed during an extensive three-year consultation and planning process, to revamp the way the League serves its member orchestras. The new name and logo are the most obvious outward signs of the League's "transform[ation of] itself to better assist orchestras with the innovation, training, research and development, leadership, and advocacy they need."
And LAO is a much better acronym, though a representative says that the League intends to refer to itself henceforth as "the League."