Don Juan with Maestro Mena

Funny story about Strauss's Don Juan, which we performed this past week with Juanjo Mena conducting. When I was in college at Eastman School of Music, our excellent and funny conductor, David Effron, told the violinists that when playing Don Juan, "Be glad you are a violinist!" I wrote this at the top of my personal copy of the first violin part of Don Juan, and I always smile and take that message to heart when we perform it.

Incidentally, Don Juan is on almost every audition list when violinists audition for American orchestras. There is lots of quick shifting, difficult arpeggios, fast scales, etc. Often for an audition the orchestra will ask for the first page only, which is plenty hard. Almost as often, though, the entire piece will be required to be learned for the audition. Of course you wouldn't play the whole piece in an audition, but you have to be ready to do it.

I liked Maestro Mena's Don Juan very much this week. It was a musical roller coaster ride, though with a strange and serious end.

Musicians Around Town

One of the interesting things about being a BSO musician is the opportunity to meet other musicians who work around the area for other musical groups and/or as faculty members for institutions like Peabody and Towson University. It is always refreshing to get to know musicians who may have other interests, talents and concerns from BSO musicians. Many of our "extra" and substitute musicians are incredibly talented; in many cases they play instruments like piano or saxophone, for which there are no permanent positions in the BSO. We BSO musicians often wind up performing chamber music and other gigs with them outside the BSO. (A current favorite among many of us is Lura Johnson, pianist extraordinaire.)

A few years ago a woman named Eva Mengelkoch called me: she was setting up a new chamber music series at the Cylburn Mansion, located in Cylburn Arboretum near Sinai Hospital in North Baltimore. After many phone calls, we were able to put together an inaugural concert for this new series, lining up Ken Goldstein and Karin Brown from the BSO, along with Karin's husband, Dan Levitov. Eva performed as the pianist in that concert.

Since then (this was approximately 5 or so years ago, I think) Eva's series has established itself. My quartet, the Atlantic String Quartet, has performed there many times. This coming week, on the evening of May 12, Rebecca Nichols, Karin Brown and Bo Li will join Eva for another concert. We will be playing the Franck Piano Quintet with Eva and Beethoven's String Quartet Opus 59, #1.

Eva is a versatile musician. Just a week and a half ago, she was the soloist in a Pro Musica Rara concert at Towson University's Fine Arts Center on the fortepiano for a Mozart Piano Concerto. She is a pleasure to work with; we are rehearsing again with her this week at Towson, where she is on the faculty.

What it Takes to Step Up to the Podium

Every BSO musician has his/her own ideas about what makes a good conductor. Here's what I think is needed, both personally and for the BSO, having been a part of so many concerts over the years:

Anyone auditioning the other day had to 1) show she/he understands the music being conducted, and 2) show that she/he can communicate that understanding to us BSO musicians. Neither of those criteria is as easy as it sounds. And in the case of the BSO, I have noticed that we respond well in general to rather extroverted conductors, the ones who can really "put it out there" for us to see and respond to, so to speak.

When a conductor "understands" the music, they know which tempos actually work, both from technical and from musical perspectives. They must show (sometimes in anticipation) changes of dynamics (loud and soft, decreasing and increasing) and changes of tempo very clearly so that all musicians execute those changes in the same way. They understand when their job is to be "traffic cop" and keep us together, and when to go slightly off the beaten musical track to provide an interesting detail we hadn't considered before.

Communicating the music might be the toughest part. I am amazed sometimes at how much conductor's facial expressions influence how we perform music, and how we sense that conductors are communicating with us. It is important to show that you are involved with the music, that you don't meet every different section of the music with the same poker face, smile, or grimace. On the other hand, too much emoting and even smiling can be off-putting. Dirty looks, even for an obvious mistake, are an absolute no-no.

I also like conductors who use their whole bodies to conduct, as opposed to standing very still and mostly using their arms. When you are a musician toward the back of the stage, it helps so much to see the conductor's movements peripherally. You frequently can't take your eyes of the printed music, or even your instrument at times, to look directly at the conductor, so her/his movements need to be big enough to see, and of course, they have to convey the appropriate musical signals.

I'm curious. As an audience, what do you look for in a conductor?

BSO Assistant Conductor Auditions

This afternoon BSO musicians and Marin will perform an interesting task: we have invited 5 conductors to an audition to be the BSO's Assistant Conductor next season. The Artistic Advisory Committee, on which I have served for the past 4 years, will poll BSO musicians on their preferences after seeing each candidate for about 20 minutes of conducting. In many cases 20 minutes is hardly enough to make absolute decisions, but you can often tell quite a bit in that length of time.

Should be interesting...

Music with Mena

The orchestra really enjoyed our concert last week with Juanjo Mena, one of our favorite guest conductors. We played an unfamiliar piece, the Fourth Symphony of Carl Nielsen, along with a violin concerto by Rodrigo (Jon Carney was the soloist) and Ancient Airs and Dances by Respighi.

Being a really good conductor requires so many talents; maybe it is like being the president. The conductor has to know the music as well as anyone else on stage, and then translate that knowledge into body motions and facial expressions that convey to the musicians just how to perform it. He/she has to know when to exert strong leadership, and when to let the orchestra go a bit on its own. In rehearsal, she/he needs to be showing/teaching us the piece and listening carefully at the same time to know where to stop and rehearse. (This is where some conductors fall short; they may have good ears, but it seems they almost forget that we still need them in rehearsal for difficult entrances, tempos, for the character of the music, etc.)

The nice thing is, if you missed Mena last week, you get another chance to hear us with him in mid May. We will be performing Brahms 3rd Symphony and Strauss' Don Juan along with the Schumann Piano Concerto on May 13, 14 and 15. Come see a really great program with one of our favorite guests!

Funny story about Don Juan: when I was in college, learning the piece with the Eastman Philharmonic for the first time, our conductor, David Effron, said about the attitude needed at the beginning of the very virtuosic piece "be glad you're a violinist!" I always think of that whenever we play this exciting, difficult piece, and it makes me smile.

AAC in Action

I bet most patrons are not aware of the AAC and it's function. One of the committees that musicians voluntarily serve on, through the election by BSO musicians, is the Artistic Advisory Committee. We discuss many aspects of BSO operations with our CEO, Paul Meecham, our General Manager, Kendra Whitlock Ingram and other artistic staff. They listen to our requests and recommendations for guest conductors and for repertoire, and we discuss other topics such as acoustics and stage set up, too.

This week we are focusing on selecting finalists for an assistant conductor audition scheduled to take place in April. Over one hundred and twenty applicants sent DVDs of themselves conducting various orchestras. We are in the process of whittling down the list to ten or so DVDs that Marin Alsop will then watch, and ultimately an invitation will go out to about five conductors to come to the audition. At the audition, they will each have about 20-25 minutes to show their stuff to us.

It is fascinating to watch conductors: each has her/his own style. Some seem more "technically" oriented; that is, they convey the tempos and rhythms of the music, and things such as dynamics (how loudly we play) with accurate signals to us, using their arms, faces and bodies. Some "dance" on the podium while others convey almost everything from the waist up. And a rare few seem to describe with their entire bodies, in addition to accurate tempos and dynamics, moods, subtle turns of phrases, emotions, etc. When we see candidates who can "do it all," so to speak, then we get excited and put them on the "Yes" list for Marin.

It will be interesting to see the candidates in a few weeks.

It's March!

My favorite month of the baseball season! Well, one of my favorite months anyway. Since I was a little kid, I probably have loved baseball best of all sports. Besides playing with friends after school, I played organized baseball every year from when I was 10 to the summer between freshman and sophomore years in college. Until around then, I wanted to be a major league baseball player. Then I realized that serious baseball players don't attend the University of Rochester, but that aspiring musicians do. (I transferred that fall to the Eastman School of Music, part of the U. of Rochester.)

I started out as a shortstop, and when I was 10 our team won the city championship (my first and last.) Unfortunately the following spring at a practice fielding a ground ball, the ball struck a rock and bounced up into my eye. It knocked me out and put me in the hospital for 10 days because of the internal bleeding. Needless to say, I moved to the outfield for the rest of my career! I think my batting style was of the "swing hard in care you hit it" philosophy. I could hit it pretty far on occasion, but I missed it entirely sometimes too.

I love the O's. I am a die hard fan, usually losing interest only in late August and September, when the losing seems to accelerate. I watch and/or listen on the radio to parts of many games, and follow the players with interest. I'm excited this year because in addition to the young pitchers and position players, the O's seem to have added a few crucial veterans, like Tejada and Millwood. I know we are in a tough division with the (stupid) Yankees and the Red Sox, but who knows? Could this be our surprise year?

By the way, BSO musicians are very appreciative of the support of Peter and Georgia Angelos, who have given generously to the BSO over the years.

In March, all the teams have the same record, so anything is still possible. ;-)