Among the Bryan Symphony Orchestra's educational priorities are its annual concerts for area fourth graders and the annual scholarships it gives to music students in the strings program at TTU.
Every year, the symphony gives two full performances in TTU's concert hall, Wattenbarger Auditorium, to the approximately 800 4th-graders who attend Putnam County's nine elementary schools. The BSO also provides educational material -- typically on the concert's featured composers and instruments -- to the schools' music teachers.
These education concerts are a long-standing tradition with the symphony; its first auxiliary group, the Symphony Guild, made the concerts its highest fund-raising priority. The guild, which has since reorganized into the Bryan Symphony Orchestra Association, won the American Symphony Orchestra League's Sally Parker Award in 1995 for its success in bringing classical music to public schools.
A long-time supporter of Tennessee Tech University, as well as the public school system in Putnam County, First National Bank of Tennessee is one of the BSO's education and community engagement sponsors, helping make the education concerts possible.
