Sarasota Concert Association names new board president

"You should be writing about my husband,” says Charlie Berardesco to a reporter who wants to know more about the new board president of Sarasota Concert Association.

A retired energy industry corporate executive, Berardesco is passionate about the arts, something he shares with his husband, musician Jeffrey Thurston. They were recently honored by Chorus America with its 2025 Philanthropy Award.

Throughout his career as a corporate lawyer and CEO, Berardesco has also served on the boards of several nonprofit arts and advocacy groups, including Chorus America. That’s where he met Linda Moxley, who became Sarasota Concert Association’s first executive director in October 2020.

Until Moxley arrived on the scene in the wake of COVID-19, SCA was managed entirely by volunteers. The 2025-26 season is the group’s 86th.

At SCA, Berardesco replaces Joy McIntyre, the retired opera singer and educator who has made service to Sarasota arts groups her third career.

McIntyre, who remains on the SCA board as immediate past president, was also previously president of SCA from 2013-21.

New additions to the SCA board include Karen Brown, Bruce Ensinger, Trevor Johnson and Monica Van Buskirk.

In an interview, Berardesco said Moxley invited him to get involved in SCA during at a lunch at the old Tommy Bahama on St. Armands sometime in 2022-23 after he and Thurston retired here. “The arts community is amazing here,” Berardesco enthused.

“I’ve known Charlie for about 20 years,” Moxley says. “He was on the board of the Baltimore Choral Arts Society when I was executive director. We both served on the board of Chorus America. He’s been on our board for about a year and a half now. We’re fortunate to have him now leading the board.”

Before retiring to Sarasota, Berardesco served as vice president, general counsel and corporate secretary of the North American Electric Reliability Corp., a not-for-profit whose mandate is to assure the reliability of the power system in North America.

Berardesco previously held senior leadership roles at Constellation Energy following nearly two decades in corporate law.

Long before Sarasota had an orchestra, opera or ballet, Sarasota Concert Association was established to bring world-class musical entertainment to a once-sleepy Gulf Coast town. 

Over the years, as Sarasota’s homegrown arts groups have grown up, SCA has continued to flourish, consistently selling out concerts, including a Dec. 2 show by Canadian Brass at the Sarasota Opera House.

SCA’s 2025-26 lineup includes the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (Jan. 19), Philadelphia Orchestra (Feb. 16), Danish String Quartet (Feb. 24), pianist Alexander Malofeev (March 10) and violinist Joshua Bell and the Academy of St. Martin’s in the Fields (March 15).