With a program featuring Mozart and Beethoven, the Elgin Symphony welcomed Herbert Quelle, Consul General of the Federal Republic of Germany in Chicago, as one of its guests for Saturday night’s performance at the Hemmens Cultural Center.
“This is my first trip to Elgin,” Quelle said at a reception held before the concert.
Quelle said he took the consul general position last July, which covers representing Germany to 13 states in the middle of the country.
“Chicago is the main seed for the entire Midwest,” Quelle said. “I’ve been impressed by the openness and friendliness of the people here. They seem down to earth.”
Elgin Symphony Orchestra board member Andre Fiebig invited Quelle and his wife, Corinna, to the concert.
“I knew the consul general was relatively new at his post,” Fiebig said. “At the same time, he had heard there are a lot of German businesses with offices in Elgin.”
Fiebig is a partner at the Chicago law firm Quarles & Brady. According to the firm’s website, Fiebig specializes in mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, compliance commercial law and antitrust. He also serves as external general counsel in the U.S. for some foreign businesses and provides compliance advice and training to a number of the firm’s foreign clients.
Quarles & Brady sponsored the pre-show business networking event along with integrated professional services firm Rödl & Partner and environmental and occupational health consulting firm Carnow Conibear & Associates. The ESO and the Elgin Development Group hosted the reception, which was held in the basement of the Hemmens.
Elgin Development Group Economic Development Director Tony Lucenko estimated there are at least 30 businesses with German ties in Elgin.
Several factors make Elgin a good location for German businesses, German American Chamber of Commerce of the Midwest Vice President Mark Tomkins said. Tomkins also was a guest at the Saturday gathering.
“Elgin’s location off the Interstate is one factor, which puts it close enough to Chicago and its airport. Another is the workforce with skilled people,” Tomkins said. “Elgin also has a good number of businesses in or around it that feed the supply chain of the German businesses. The price of real estate in Elgin also makes it appealing.”
Tomkins said what sets Elgin apart for cities with a bigger number of German businesses is the diversity of those located here compared to other regions where the German firms might have offices tied to one specific industry.
Along with members of the Elgin area and Chicago business community, Elgin officials at the Saturday event included Lucenko, Elgin Chamber of Commerce President Carol Gieske, Mayor David Kaptain, and City Council members Rich Dunne, Rose Martinez, Carol Rauschenberger, and John Steffen.
Kaptain told those gathered that arts are important to Elgin and that the Elgin Symphony Orchestra’s roots go deep and back at least 50 years. He paid compliment to the symphony, which, like Elgin, has been “changing to what the (economic) conditions are.”
Kaptain also said, “I truly believe Elgin is the arts center of the northwest suburbs.”
Elgin Symphony Orchestra Maestro Andrew Grams welcomed the reception’s guests and asked them to talk about the music they would be hearing that night at intermission, after the concert, and beyond.
“Our goal is to show that classical music is not elitist. It is for everyone,” Grams said. “The opportunity a venue such as the Hemmens provides is for people to come together to be part of a live performance.”
