Thousands attend expanded summer symphony concerts in Victoria’s inner harbour

Several thousand people attended Symphony SPLASH in Victoria over the long weekend.

Organizers of a massive concert series in Victoria’s inner harbour say it’s estimated 60,000 people soaked up Symphony SPLASH during the course of the long-weekend event – with 40,000 attendees for the finale alone on Sunday night.

“It just felt utterly magical,” says Victoria Symphony CEO, Matthew White.

Symphony SPLASH was back in B.C.’s capital with the help of major financial sponsors, after a five-year hiatus due to the pandemic.

The expanded event on a barge stage featured four live orchestral performances from Victoria Symphony and The National Youth Orchestra of Canada. There were also special guest performances, including JUNO-nominated Indigenous singer-songwriters Celeigh Cardinal and Shawnee Kiss.

“As an administrator, we spend a lot of time doing what I would describe as fairly boring things, making sure that you’ve got enough insurance and that everybody’s going to be in the right place at the right time. But, you know, what was really special was that at the sort of culmination of all of that hard work, I saw joy everywhere,” says White. “Really our core purpose is to help provide inspiration to people and an event that whimsical and magical did exactly that.”

Victoria’s Symphony is celebrating its 85th anniversary. From here, the CEO says the group will be working with Destination Greater Victoria to assess the event’s economic impact and exploring future options.

“We have the expertise and we’ve got the love, so now we just need more funding to make sure that it keeps happening,” says White.