Santa Fe Opera has announced the company has broken $1 million in its ticket donation campaign meant to keep the organization afloat and help compensate its workers during this time of closed theaters.

Earlier this year, the company had experienced great success in ticket sales, reaching nearly $5 million. Since the spread of the coronavirus and the closure of public venues, Santa Fe Opera has cancelled its summer season and announced its donation campaign, where it hopes to recoup half as much as it had initially raised through ticket sales in the form of donations.

Santa Fe Opera general director Robert K. Meya has expressed his desire to support the staff and artists of the company, saying, “This is financial assistance that really, for the most part, is something that we are doing on a voluntary basis because we want to take care of our employees. We want to take care of our seasonal staff. We want to take care of our singers and our musicians. Many of them are like family, and they come back year after year after year, so we are going to do our very, very best to do what we can to help them through this very difficult time.”

In addition to these donations, the company has also secured a loan through the federal CARES act, which Meya says will go towards payroll for Santa Fe Opera’s full-time and seasonal employees. While overall, the company is projected to lose about $10 million in ticket sales for the year, the Santa Fe Opera is exploring new and established methods of fundraising as it work towards eventually reopening.