BY CHRIS SHULL

The Wichita Eagle

The Wichita Symphony Orchestra and Wichita Grand Opera are offering jobs to musicians from the Louisiana Philharmonic Orchestra displaced by Hurricane Katrina.

The symphony will hold open one place in its violin, viola and cello sections for each of the eight classical concerts to be presented this year. Musicians from the New Orleans-based Louisiana Philharmonic will have the first chance to fill those seats, for one concert or all eight — no audition required.

The musicians would earn around $700 a week.

“We just want to do something to help these people,” said Mitchell Berman, executive director of the orchestra.

The Louisiana Philharmonic has temporarily disbanded because its performance hall in downtown New Orleans is flooded. The 66 musicians in the ensemble are scattered across the country, on their own or staying with family and friends.

Violinist Ovidiu Sutic is one of those musicians. He and his wife, Anne — also a violinist — are staying in Wichita with her family. After playing a summer festival in Bellingham, Wash., Sutic was home in New Orleans for less than 24 hours before he heeded the evacuation order. He drove to Wichita on Sunday.

Sutic, who did graduate work at Wichita State University, was to start his second season with the Louisiana Symphony.

“I know it was flooded,” Sutic said of his home. “Right now I don’t think I will go back there.”

Sutic said he was weighing offers. “I don’t know exactly what I am going to do,” he said.

One of those offers is from Wichita Grand Opera. Parvan Bakardiev, the company’s general director, said he invited the Sutics to join the opera’s orchestra this season.

If no one from New Orleans claims the open chairs, the positions would be filled from the ranks of Wichita’s freelance musicians.
Reach Chris Shull at 268-6264 or cshull@wichitaeagle.com.

Displaced musician finds local gig

Sunday, September 04, 2005 The Grand Rapids Press

GRAND RAPIDS — A New Orleans musician will join the Grand Rapids Symphony for concerts in September and October while waiting to return home.
Bruce Owen, assistant principal violist with the Louisiana Philharmonic,departed the city Aug. 27, expecting to be gone a few days.
“I threw a few things in the car and, of course, my viola, because it’s valuable,” Owen said, speaking by phone from a friend’s home in Atlanta. “I never imagined this would happen.”
A native of Columbus, Ohio, Owen is a childhood friend of Grand Rapids Symphony violinist Christopher Martin, who helped arrange for Owen to play in
Grand Rapids.
Owen said he has heard flooding was comparatively light in his Foubourg Marigny neighborhood, east of the French Quarter, and he is hopeful he will have a home to return to.
“As awful a situation as it is, it’s provided me a chance to see some really good friends,” Owen said. “I consider myself to be extremely lucky.”