Lora Lynn Snow, Founder and Executive Director of the Ariel-Ann Carson Dater Performing Arts Centre in Gallipolis, home of The Ohio Valley Symphony has been selected for the 2020 Governor’s Awards for the Arts in Ohio, the State of Ohio’s most prestigious annual arts event. In recognition of her impactful and visionary leadership in Ohio’s creative sector and sustained dedication to promoting artistic excellence, she will be honored at a luncheon and ceremony on Wednesday, March 25, 2020, at 11 a.m. at the Columbus Athenaeum in downtown Columbus.
Lora, an oboist, was inspired in 1987 to form a professional orchestra in Gallia County and recognized the amazing acoustics in the long neglected 1895 Ariel Opera House that had been abandoned for 25 years. Lora spearheaded the restoration and set about to organize the community towards the Grand Reopening of the historic Ariel in 1990 with a performance of The Ohio Valley Symphony. Mrs. Ann Carson Dater gifted the Ariel as a permanent home to The Ohio Valley Symphony in 2005 which added an additional theatre, conference room and banquet rooms. The OVS, now in its 30th season as the only professional orchestra in the Ohio River Valley, recently premiered Songs of Rural America on PBS nationwide with folk singer Michael Johnathon.
Having a holistic view of the arts, Lora also established a music education program, a double reed festival, a community theatre troupe, an OVS woodwind and dance programs at the Ariel. An active recitalist, clinician, and consultant with bachelor’s and master’s degrees in music performance and education from The Ohio State University, Lora has taught at several universities and public schools covering kindergarten through graduate level inclusive. She is principal oboist for The Ohio Valley Symphony and OVS Woodwind Quintet, a member of the West Virginia Symphony and a freelance musician.