California · Nonprofit
Stern Grove Festival Association
Stern Grove Festival Association (California) receives grants from 51 organizations whose IRS filings report $4,679,779 to it, the largest being THE WILLIAM & FLORA HEWLETT FOUNDATION ($740,000). 38 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2025
- $5.9M
- Funders on record
- 51
- Grants received
- $4.7M
- Net assets
- $18M
What Stern Grove Festival Association does
Mission
The mission of SGFA is to make live musical experiences accessible to all. The organization does this by providing ten admission free performances in Sigmund Stern Grove - a facility and park that was donated to the City of San Francisco by SGFA. Approximately 95,000 attend performances at Stern Grove Festival each year. Additionally, SGFA provides music and dance education programs - also free of charge - to thousands of children each year. These programs take place at Sigmund Stern Grove, public schools, and community centers around the City of San Francisco.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Program
Concert Programs: Stern Grove Festival was founded in 1938 by Mrs. Rosalie Meyer Stern, a civic activist and arts patron who envisioned a series of free performances open to the public in Sigmund Stern Grove, a stunning natural amphitheater and park in San Francisco. Generations of music and nature lovers gather at Stern Grove Festival to enjoy world-class artists, picnicking, and relaxation in serene meadow surrounded by giant eucalyptus and redwood trees. Stern Grove was redesigned by renowned landscape architect, Lawrence Halprin, and is a world-class performance art facility and a natural jewel in the heart of the city. Since 1938, Stern Grove Festival has presented admission-free, outdoor concerts for Bay Area residents and visitors.
$4,427,671 spent$613,966 earned by the program100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $4,427,671.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2021 to 2022, from $18M to $15M (−17%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Government-grant reliance: 2017 3% · 2018 5% · 2019 1% · 2020 2% · 2021 6% · 2022 8% · 2023 16% · 2024 3% · 2025 2%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
62% of Stern Grove Festival Association’s revenue is contributions — about as donation-reliant as the typical peer (63% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 4 of the last 9 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Chief executive
Robert Fiedler
Executive Director
Board chair
Matthew W Goldman
Chairman
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 15 funders to 27 funders, grant income rose $315k → $702k.
16 of 51 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 48% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
Left out of every figure on this page: $3.3M from one payer (the payer shares this organization's board, largest Lisa & Douglas Goldman Fund). These are real filings, and they are not money Stern Grove Festival Association raised.
From the IRS filings of Stern Grove Festival Association’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 51 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
Stern Grove Festival Association has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 16% of grant income, and it takes 6 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 6 funders to its left
54% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund Stern Grove Festival Association.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 24% · 2018 38% · 2019 19% · 2020 37% · 2021 33% · 2022 14% · 2023 34% — growing more concentrated.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
61% of Stern Grove Festival Association's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 75% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
93% of Stern Grove Festival Association's grant income comes from California funders.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $2.2M arriving through sponsors registered in 11 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Against its field
Stern Grove Festival Association's funding base is broadening — from 15 funders to 27 as grant income climbed.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 3,230 arts & culture nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025
Government funding Stern Grove Festival Association receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $175k on record.
- National Endowment for the Arts$175k
Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.
Organizations like Stern Grove Festival Association
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In California
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
75% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
69%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for Stern Grove Festival Association: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds Stern Grove Festival Association?
- Stern Grove Festival Association (California) receives grants from 51 organizations whose IRS filings report $4,679,779 to it, the largest being THE WILLIAM & FLORA HEWLETT FOUNDATION ($740,000). 38 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does Stern Grove Festival Association have?
- IRS filings report 51 organizations giving $4,679,779 in grants to Stern Grove Festival Association, 38 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of Stern Grove Festival Association?
- THE WILLIAM & FLORA HEWLETT FOUNDATION is the largest funder on record, with $740,000 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like Stern Grove Festival Association find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in California. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
Play a game about who funds Stern Grove Festival Association →
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2017–2025), and the filings of 51 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing