Former Kennedy Center President Deborah Rutter Receives Legacy Award from Mid-Atlantic Symphony

The orchestra's former Music Director Julien Benichou was the other legacy award recipient

Deborah Rutter, who stood down as President of the Kennedy Center following a decade at the helm in January 2025, has been honored with the National Legacy Award of the Mid-Atlantic Symphony Orchestra (MSO) at its Legacy Awards Dinner.

Rutter's tenure at the Kennedy Center saw immense growth: earned revenue rose to the sum of $125 million, in addition to $95 million in contributed funds, $45 million in federal appropriations for the operation, maintenance, and improvement of the memorial, and a $4 million draw from the endowment in the fiscal year 2024.

Rutter is also credited with securing Italian conductor Gianandrea Noseda as Music Director of the National Symphony Orchestra in 2016. As part of the Center’s 50th Anniversary Season, she oversaw the development and opening of "Arts & Ideals: President John F. Kennedy," a permanent exhibit exploring President Kennedy’s connection to arts and culture. She ran the Kennedy Center’s first expansion in its 54-year history, culminating in building an arts facility full of studios and classrooms called the REACH.

Rutter also led the organization through its 18-month closure during the pandemic and led its subsequent reopening.

At the awards dinner, the MSO also honored its past Music Director, Julien Benichou, with the MSO's annual Legacy Award.

"Deborah Rutter has inspired all of us in America’s arts community as the long-time leader of our national arts center, and Julien Benichou dramatically raised the professional quality of our orchestra, and expanded its season and its supporter base," said MSO Chairman Jeffrey Parker.

At the event, Rutter emphasized the need for institutions to "continue to support the artist wherever they feel welcome, supported, empowered and unencumbered to share their art and express their creative talent." She also spoke on the value of the citizen-artist, noting examples such as that of Yo-Yo Ma.