Orchestra Teams Up With Evangelical Mega-Church

The Houston Symphony has an unusual new partner for its holiday concerts: Lakewood Church, arguably the world’s most famous mega-church, seating 16,000, its services seen across the U.S. on television each week. “To Lakewood, the symphony offers cachet and a high-quality orchestra. To the symphony, Lakewood offers a large untapped audience and an extraordinary marketing machine… The church and the symphony readily admit that their usual audiences don’t overlap much, [but] Lakewood has far more to offer the symphony than just an audience. Symphony management can also learn something from Lakewood about branding… And it’s possible that further collaboration could provide a huge new outlet for the symphony’s work. The two organizations are eyeing a long-term relationship.”