Shortly after Collegium Instrumentale was founded in 1968 the "Society of the Friends of Collegium Instrumentale Alois Kottmann" ("Vereinigung der Freunde des Collegium Instrumentale Alois Kottmann e.V.") was established on the initiative of Margrit von Bethmann in Frankfurt am Main.

The aim was, and remains, to promote the Frankfurt Carl Flesch string tradition. The support offered to young talents and to the works of Frankfurt composers still continues in the form of the Senckenberg Concerts, started by Margrit von Bethmann and Alois Kottmann, which have been organised for a number of years now in conjunction with the Cultural Department of the City of Frankfurt.

The Founding Chairman, the Frankfurt patron Dr. Rüdiger Volhard, is once again, after a break of several years during which the banker Hans Ludolf Koch took over the role, the honorary chairman and patron of this orchestra initiative.