Leadership

Drawing on 30 years of arts management experience and a lifelong love of music as both an avid audience member and musician, Jeffrey P. Haydon serves as President and CEO of Ravinia Festival, a post he has held since September 2020. He positioned Ravinia as one of the first venues in the country to reopen in 2021 out of the pandemic. Since then, Haydon has led Ravinia to secure over $75 million in support of the endowment and capital projects; recruit Kurt Elling as Jazz Advisor to on- and offstage programming; deepen the impact of Ravinia’s Reach Teach Play^® music programs in underserved communities; expand engagement with Steans Institute alumni on- and offstage; launch the Breaking Barriers Festival, highlighting women leaders in classical music and connected fields, with Ravinia Chief Conductor Marin Alsop; and invest in both audience- and guest artist-experience enhancements invest in both audience- and guest artist-experience enhancements through the renovation of all of Ravinia’s stages, including the iconic Pavilion.

Prior to joining Ravinia, Haydon served as CEO of Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts for eight years, leading a renaissance at the Center by raising over $40 million to quadruple the endowment and invest over $15 million into the historic 90-acre estate. He also launched several new programmatic initiatives and led Caramoor to expand its yearly programming by over 80 percent, and he initiated numerous community collaborations, all while improving Caramoor’s financial performance by over 20 percent.

Haydon also previously served as Executive Director of the Ojai Music Festival, where he led the festival through a number of major transformations to further position it as one of the preeminent musical destinations for artists and audiences alike, including rebuilding Ojai’s historic Libbey Bowl. Earlier in his career, Haydon held positions with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Fort Wayne Philharmonic, Aspen Music Festival, and the University of Puget Sound’s Cultural Events Series. As part of the League of American Orchestras’ Orchestra Management Fellowship Program, Haydon worked with the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, Fort Wayne Philharmonic, and Seattle Symphony.

Haydon earned a Bachelor of Arts in Business Administration through the Business Leadership honors program and a minor in music from the University of Puget Sound. He also completed the Stanford Business School’s competitive Executive Non-Profit Leaders in the Arts program in association with National Arts Strategies. Outside of Ravinia, Haydon enjoys singing in a semi-professional choir and spending time with his family.