Read the 2019 CNY Arts study “Arts & Culture Impact” by Travis Newton which measures the economic impact of Onondaga County's arts and culture industry. 

About Travis Newton

With a career that has included work as an arts and higher education administrator, musician, and faculty member, Dr. Travis Newton serves as interim Dean of the Carroll College of Arts and Sciences at Le Moyne College in Syracuse, NY. Previously, he served as director of the Le Moyne College music program, leading the program through renewal and growth. He also founded the College’s undergraduate and graduate arts administration programs, successfully preparing students for careers at such varied not-for-profit institutions as the Manhattan School of Music, the San Diego Zoo, the National Museum for African American Music, Barrington Stage, and Cornell University. 

Before his current role as interim Dean, Travis served as associate professor and chair of the department of visual and performing arts, facilitating the work of dozens of faculty and hundreds of students to further integrate the arts into the culture of the Le Moyne College campus, and to engage with the broader Syracuse community.

Dr. Newton’s research is focused on orchestra management and the relationship between professional symphony orchestras and their communities. In 2022, Oxford University Press published his Orchestra Management Handbook. His work has also been published in the Journal of Arts Management, Law & Society, American Journal of Arts Management, Artivate: A Journal of Entrepreneurship in the Arts, and book chapters published by Routledge and Oxford University Press, including a co-authored chapter in The Oxford Handbook of Arts and Cultural Management. Dr. Newton previously served as an officer of the Association of Arts Administration Educators Board of Directors and as a board member of Classical Kids Music Education, and he currently serves on the board of the Syracuse Friends of Chamber Music, as well as Social Theory, Politics, & the Arts (STP&A). 

Travis has played and conducted more than 500 performances of Broadway musicals across the U.S. and Canada and multiple guest conducting appearances with the Syracuse Symphony Orchestra and Central New York's professional orchestra, The Syracuse Orchestra (formerly Symphoria). 

He holds a bachelor's degree in music performance (violin) from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro, an MBA from Le Moyne College, and a Ph.D. in Arts Administration from the University of Kentucky.