there was just two symphony orchestras in Venezuela

[keannu]

Does "there was just two symphony orchestras in Venezuela" make sense? Doesn't it have to be "there were"? I think this is similar to "There's 10 houses on the hill" in colloquial speech, which is not that much allowed in writing.
si1-3)The System [SUP]22)[/SUP]grew out of the vision of one man, Jose Antonio Abreu, [SUP]23)[/SUP]who wanted to make a change in the social conditions in his country. When Abreu began in 1975, [SUP]24)[/SUP]there was just two symphony orchestras in Venezuela. The first day, he could gather only 11 youngsters for a rehearsal in [SUP]25)[/SUP]an underground garage.

 

[emsr2d2]

You tend only to hear "There's" used instead of "There are" when we are speaking in the present tense. We don't tend to get it wrong in the past tense. If it should be "There were" then we say "There were". We never abbreviate "There was" to "There's".

The correct version of that sentence is "There were just two symphony orchestras in Venezuela".

 

[konungursvia]

That's true, in rapid speech, but it's wrong as soon as you commit it to writing.

 

[emsr2d2]

That's true, in rapid speech, but it's wrong as soon as you commit it to writing.

Yes, that's why I used "You only tend to hear ..." and "when we are speaking ...", instead of "read" and "writing".