The Tulsa Philharmonic was an American symphony orchestra located in Tulsa, Oklahoma. The orchestra was founded in 1948 by H. Arthur Brown who was principal conductor from 1948 till 1958. The original Tulsa Philharmonic grew out of a small group called the Tulsa Civic Symphony created in 1926-27 by Kurt Berger, a German-born and -educated musician living in Tulsa. Many of the symphony's musicians also played in the pit orchestra for the Tulsa Little Theatre. After its premier concert at the Akdar Theater as the Tulsa Civic Symphony in January 1927, the small orchestra was directed by Berger until 1933, when illness forced him to retire. His daughter, Tosca Berger Kramer, briefly succeeded him. George Baum also directed an orchestra under Works Progress Administration funding in the 1930s a