The Story

In 2003, Florrie and Seymour Morgenstern identified a need in their Florida community for live classical music and dance programming. Several sources for such entertainment existed, but missed the mark in various ways. Venues such as the Broward Center in Fort Lauderdale and the Kravis Center in Palm Beach offer high-caliber performances, but have the inherent limitations of inconvenient access and high ticket cost. 

These limitations tend to limit the audience to patrons who are more serious classical arts enthusiasts, and are willing to pay high ticket prices and parking fees, and who don't mind traveling more than 30 minutes into a city in order to be part of a large crowd experience.

Florrie, herself a lifelong musician and music-lover, concluded that if any better alternative was ever to exist, someone would need to take the lead to make it happen. Her business experience was extensive, although limited to women's apparel retailing. But she and Seymour had the vision, the personal credibility, and the energy to mobilize their extensive network of friends. Community for Performing Arts was born!

After successfully finding and securing a modern, acoustically engineered, 1450-seat venue with a convenient location and ample, free parking, CPA contracted high-quality local talent for four performances during that first winter.  One-by-one, each of the details was addressed, but the potentially monumental task of selling those 1450 subscriptions loomed. As it turned out, the concept resonated with the target audience, and the series sold out. It was such a hit, that the following year, there was virtually 100% retention of the subscribership, and additionally, word spread, and a waiting-list was created. Prior to the third season, the waiting-list got so big that a second series was added, which also sold out.

Every season since, another series was added and sold out. With virtually no advertising, word-of-mouth endorsements have brought the current subscribership to 13,000 patrons, who experience these wonderful events in two beautiful venues in Boca Raton.

Of course, CPA works hard to earn its high retention and growth rates. Participants enjoy a unique opportunity to see world-class performances in a disarmingly intimate context, all with a personal touch that reinforces the feeling that they are guests of their friends, the Morgensterns.

The name "Community for Performing Arts" was a self-fulfilling prophecy, because at the heart of this overwhelming success is a community of everyday people, who are delighted by continually having their expectations exceeded by an organization to which they feel a personal connection.