MUSICAL EXCELLENCE - For Orchestra Music Directors, Does Anything Else Really Matter? by Thomas Wolf
At the end of 2022, Gustavo Dudamel returned to his home town of Barquisimeto, Venezuela after eleven years. The international star—music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic and more recently the announced in-coming music director of the New York Philharmonic—had been, according to an article in the Los Angeles Times, in his native land, “a persona non grata after speaking out about violence and repression he felt was not being addressed by the government during a period of widespread demonstrations in the country.” The return had been a long time coming.
Gustavo Dudamel with young musicians in Venezuela (photo by Daniel Velma)
The 2022 visit was neither political nor was it part of a tour of international musical capitals where Dudamel would conduct world-renowned orchestras. “I went to see the children”—those countless music students in the country’s famed El Sistema music education program of which Dudamel is both a product and long-time music director. El Sistema is a social program as well as a musical one that reaches nearly a million young people, the majority from economically challenged environments, every year. It has had a profound impact on music education throughout the world including here in the United States.
Dudamel’s work in education and social action has not been limited to young instrumentalists. He and his wife recently made a documentary about Barquisimeto’s White Hands Choir, a chorus of deaf and hard-of-hearing children in El Sistema, a group that participated in a Los Angeles Philharmonic/Deaf West Theatre production of Beethoven “Fidelio” that Dudamel led at Disney Hall.
So what is going on here? Dudamel is one of the most celebrated conductors on the planet, the music director of three orchestras in Los Angeles, Paris, and Venezuela. Is this really an appropriate role for a music director? Given all the demands on the time of such a person—the multitudinous responsibilities of leading major orchestras—should a celebrity like Dudamel devote so much of his life’s work to such activity, no matter how awe-inspiring?
The symposium too place at Serenak, at one time the summer home of Serge Koussevitzky, former music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra with its magnificent views as pictured here (photo courtesy of the Boston Symphony Orchestra).
The question of a music director’s role is hardly a new one. In August of 2001, the Boston Symphony convened a high-level group of orchestra professionals and grantmakers at its summer home in the Berkshires in western Massachusetts. There were thirty participants at the symposium including conductors, symphony players, orchestra staff, board members, a music historian, a conservatory dean, and foundation representatives. Their task, over the course of two days, was to grapple with the question of the role of orchestra music directors in the 21st century. The convening took place appropriately at the former summer residence of the legendary Boston Symphony music director Serge Koussevitzky—the beautifully situated “Seranak.”
The meetings were closed to the public. This would be an opportunity for attendees to roll up their sleeves, prepared to discuss and debate whether the new millennium might be a possible time of change.[1] It was certainly an auspicious moment. Within 24 months, five high-profile conductors would be leaving their posts including Seiji Ozawa in Boston (after a quarter century), Christopher von Dohnanyi in Cleveland and Kurt Mazur in New York; in Europe, Claudio Abbado would be leaving the Berlin Philharmonic and Bernard Haitink would be stepping down from London’s Royal Opera. Clearly this was an opportunity to take stock and perhaps think about a new paradigm.
At the time of the symposium in 2001, Seiji Ozawa was one of five major music directors who was planning to step down from his post. There was a real question of what the profile of successors would or should look like. Photo by Stu Rosner.
This meeting was to be unlike many others taking place at the time where symphony people often talked to one another in an echo chamber of long-held common assumptions. The presence of six highly-placed foundation representatives who had funded the event was key. Experienced and in some cases battle-scarred by orchestra funding that had failed to accomplish the goals that had been promised, the funders had some hard questions for the group. What did “musical excellence” actually mean, what was the music director’s role in accomplishing it, and to what extent did it really matter?[2] What was the music director’s obligation to an orchestra’s audience, to its broader community, to young people, to the art form itself? What role did a music director play in shaping the orchestra institution in an era of declining audiences, rising deficits, and, according to some observers, increasing irrelevance?
While the discussions were pleasant, there were moments of tension. Conductors and orchestral musicians were clear that building the musical excellence of an orchestra ensemble was and always had been the main function of a music director. What about other functions, asked the funders? Didn’t the music director have some role in designing initiatives in education and programs that would serve a broad community well beyond its traditional audience? Did music directors have a role in expanding programming and the way in which it is presented to the public? In an age when the profile of some orchestras within their communities had diminished, when children grew up with little or no music education and it was primarily the affluent that had the luxury of learning to play an instrument, didn’t the music director’s role go further? A board member who was attending the meeting asked a question that added another responsibility: didn’t a music director have a role in socializing with donors and trustees and assisting with fund raising?
The frustration of conductors and orchestra musicians was at times quite palpable. One of the instrumentalists, a principal player from a major orchestra, recounted a recent music director search in his orchestra that revealed some of the very tensions occurring at the meeting.
The committee convened and we discussed what we were looking for in a music director. The musicians wanted someone who would raise the artistic level of the orchestra even beyond what we are accustomed to. Board members were looking for someone who could walk into a room and galvanize donors to write bigger checks. Management wanted someone who would tend skillfully to personnel issues, planning seasons, and associated administrative tasks. Some people wanted a music director who would spend a lot of time in town working for the orchestra. Others said it should be someone who could communicate well in the community—perhaps an American. A few thought it might be nice to find a rising star whose stardom could grow to match that of the orchestra. But in the end, as we distilled the attributes down and when we looked at a list of 100 potential candidates, the list shrank rapidly as we decided the one most important factor we needed was a truly great musician. We could give up on a CEO, a community spokesperson, a fundraiser, but we could not give up on someone who could make music at the highest level—someone whose artistic excellence would propel the orchestra to new heights.
Many of the other performers in the group nodded their heads. Being a musical superstar who could advance the excellence of a musical ensemble was a full-time job, they said, and it was even more challenging when individual conductors spent as much time jet-setting around the globe for guest conducting appearances as they did building the quality of the home-town orchestra. Let others take on these “lesser” tasks like education, community, or alternative concert formats and venues.
The irony of the location of this debate was not lost on some people who had a sense of the history of the meeting place. Tanglewood – or more accurately, the Berkshire Music Center – was founded by one of the greatest music directors of all time as an educational institution where new and experimental work was constantly being commissioned and introduced in innovative ways. And while traditional concerts had taken on an ever-more prominent role since its founding, education and innovative programming continued to be a major component of its mission. True, the kind of education Koussevitzky championed at the outset had more to do with training a next generation of professional musicians than doing “community engagement,” yet his legacy inspired subsequent generations of important conductors to expand on this mission.
Christoph Eschenbach, one of a number of high profile music directors conducting and touring with Carnegie Hall’s National Youth Orchestra—USA (photo courtesy of Carnegie Hall).
Today, we see major conductors/music directors involved in educational and community activities of all sorts and there is much evidence that this has not required them to compromise their commitment to musical excellence. Take Carnegie Hall’s summer-based National Youth Orchestra-USA – a remarkable collection of teen-agers from throughout the United States whose demographics are reflective of the country as a whole.
Some of these young people may become professional musicians, others will go on to other occupations. But all will have a life-changing experience. They will be exposed to a who’s who of major conductor/music directors who devote considerable time and talent to take this ensemble on tours throughout the world. This star-studded cast has included Valery Gergiev, David Robertson, Charles Dutoit, Christopher Eschenbach, Marin Alsop, Michael Tilson Thomas, Sir Antonio Pappano, and Sir Andrew Davis.
Music Directors have also played a prominent role in innovating the musical experience itself with new work, alternative venues, and different presentational formats. Michael Tilson Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony’s Soundbox is a perfect example—a converted rehearsal hall for musical innovation in an informal setting. Here is how one concert-goer described the experience in a Yelp review.[3]
First, take a cavernous rehearsal room and use electronics to make the acoustics seem decent.
Second, take a small subset of the symphony and put them in intimate company with concertgoers, spreading them all across the room at small stages accommodating no more than a dozen musicians each.
Third, encourage the musicians to interact with the audience by explaining each piece in detail and in context beforehand, particularly how it fits into the night's overall theme.
Fourth, accentuate the aural experience with modern, multimedia visuals projected onto screens all around the room.
Fifth, encourage a loungey atmosphere by positioning bars all along the room, not discouraging people from taking pictures or selfies or from drinking during the performance, and providing a variety of seating, whether small cocktail tables or leather benches.
It all seems like a great way to dress up what's otherwise the same old œuvre of classical music and make it relevant to our contemporary world.
Soundscape Park in Miami with its large screen where many of Michael Tilson Thomas’ evening concerts with the New World Symphony have been projected to be enjoyed free of charge by community members.
Michael Tilson Thomas has piloted other innovations in concert formats and programming (mini-concerts, educational concerts, “journey” concerts) to make them more accessible to audiences of various ages and experience levels. Many of his Miami-based concerts at his New World Symphony have been projected on a large screen in Soundscape Park, a flexible, multi-use space adjacent to the concert hall, where the music was available to anyone who happened to be there, free of charge.
With the San Francisco Symphony, Thomas introduced a series called Keeping Score, an innovative, thought-provoking classical music offering that could be enjoyed on PBS television, radio, the web, and through an education program—a national model for classroom arts integration for K-12 teachers. Indeed, Michael Tilson Thomas’ career is the perfect answer to those who claim that important music directors simply don’t have time to attend to education and community concerns.
Tilson Thomas’ efforts in education are also noteworthy. As a co-founder and artistic director of the New World Symphony, he has been responsible for training hundreds of young musicians to prepare for orchestral careers. That training has not only included musical aspects of orchestral playing but a wider-range of skills required in being a well-rounded musical citizen. According to the late Bruce Coppock, who led the staff of both the Saint Louis Symphony and the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra in addition to consulting for many more ensembles, when a New World graduate joined one of his orchestras, it was like a breath of fresh air, with young musicians bringing a much broader attitude and understanding of the educational and community aspects of the job with no diminution in musical ability.
Marin Alsop with young musicians from OrchKids, a program she founded.
Other music directors have championed important initiatives in education and community. Marin Alsop, while Music Director of the Baltimore Symphony, founded OrchKids, a program that “provides Baltimore youth with equitable access to community-based, high-quality music instruction and programming that teaches musical and social skills transferable to all areas of their lives.” According to Alsop, “I truly believe that every child is born a genius, filled with endless possibility.”
Nor have Alsop’s education and community efforts been limited to the training of young instrumentalists. Her Baltimore Symphony became an important force and participant in community cohesion at key moments in the City’s history. After the tumultuous riots following the murder of a young Black man named Freddie Gray, for example, Alsop led the orchestra before a huge crowd in an open-air concert dedicated to the community’s coming together through music. The concert program ranged from an African-American spiritual to the “Star-Spangled Banner” to “Baltimore, Our Baltimore” with additional music by Bach and Handel. One tweet from the event proclaimed: “Violins in the Street not violence. Baltimore Symphony Orchestra performs outside open air blocks from epicenter.”
Young Finnish conductor, Klaus Mäkelä. Will he and others of his generation demonstrate a strong commitment to a young generation of potential music lovers and musicians, a local community (or several), and the orchestra art form itself?
With so many music directors seriously involved in activities of this kind, one might hope that those who write about conductors would take note. One professional who has written eloquently on the expanded role of music directors is Simon Woods who heads the League of American Orchestras. But sadly, many of those who write for the mainstream media have been slow to move beyond the stereotype of the traditional European autocrat whose sole focus is conducting great music. A recent article by Alex Ross in the New Yorker is a good example. Profiling young and up-coming conductors who may be important music directors of the next generation Ross did not once mention their work in education and community engagement. Was it really so important for Ross to tell us that Klaus Mäkelä, “a twenty-six-year-old Finn who has shot to podium fame as precipitately as anyone in history, has high cheekbones and sleekly styled hair…and looks the part of the dashing European maestro”?
Perhaps it matters to some people. But a quarter century from now, it will undoubtedly be forgotten. What may be remembered is whether or not Mäkelä or any other young conductor saw his or her role and legacy more broadly in service to a young generation of potential music lovers and musicians, a local community (or several), and the orchestra art form itself.
NOTE: I am grateful to Alan Brown, Dennie Palmer Wolf, and Joe Kluger for their suggestions on an earlier version of this piece.
[1] A full report on the symposium can be found at https://wolfbrown.com/insights/reports/21st-century-music-director/.
[2] During the course of the symposium, funders cited research commissioned by the Knight Foundation that indicated that many audience members do not even list excellence of performance as a primary incentive for attending a concert. The research also indicated that large portions of classical music audiences have very little musical background and that there appeared to be little correlation between audience members’ levels of enjoyment of concerts and their levels of musical training. Finally, audiences attend concerts for many reasons, only some of which relate to the singular high quality of the performance. (cf., “Classical Music Consumer Segmentation Study: How Americans Relate to Classical Music and their Local Orchestras,” conducted by Audience Insight, 2002, published by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, ISBN 0-9740748-0-2
[3] SOUNDBOX - 24 Photos - 300 Franklin St, San Francisco, CA - Yelp (accessed March 8, 2023)