Big week, Part I

As Sam noted in his recent post, I've been a little preoccupied this week with my subscription debut with the Orchestra.

In many ways, it's a big deal; it's my debut on a series that's considered both "front-ranking" and the most artistically significant. And, of course, Minnesota is a major American orchestra, so these concerts carry a weight, in terms of my career, far beyond Minneapolis; other orchestras and presenters watch with interest when a staff conductor takes on a major program.

In many other ways, this week has been just business as usual; first of all, because I've certainly conducted subscription concerts with many other orchestras (albeit smaller organizations), and second, because this is my home orchestra, everything has been a well-known quantity (there's certainly a huge benefit to knowing an ensemble well).

Since this week's program has been in my book for about 10 months, I've had ample time to wrap my head around the program - which is a challenging one, both for myself and the Orchestra! Two pieces were "given" to me - the Mozart Sinfonia Concertante for Winds and Copland's "Quiet City", pieces meant to showcase members of the Orchestra as soloists. I ran with the whole idea of showcasing our musicians, which is where the idea of Concerti for Orchestra (Shchedrin and Lustoslawski).

I've been asked why I chose the Lutoslawski as my main work rather than, say, the Bartok Concerto for Orchestra, which is certainly a better-known piece and a staple of the repertoire. My choice of Lutoslawski comes from two strongly held convictions; one, that part of my job as a musician is to champion lesser-known but artistically worthy pieces that can help broaden the standard repertoire (in particular, if I have a powerful connection to those pieces), and two, that as a young conductor, my artistic growth is enhanced by working on repertoire that is not already ingrained in an ensemble.

Osmo and I agree on that second point (we chatted about it sometime last season). An orchestra of Minnesota's standing has played the standard repertoire countless (countless!) times - just thinking about the collective experience with, say, the Bartok Concerto for Orchestra, is staggering. Which means that the Orchestra has deeply etched ideas of how that piece should go, how the work "feels" when played by this particular ensemble, and which idiomatic or traditional "extras" (not indicated in the score, perhaps, but part of an accepted performance practice) that they'll execute without even thinking about it. All of which, while easy on an ensemble, is hard on a conductor, particularly if you have a differing view of the work. The challenge in this lies in getting an ensemble to see your perspective and to adopt that view over the rehearsal period.

Rehearsing a piece that hasn't been played in 15 years (1993 was the last time the Lutoslawski was performed here) presents very different challenges, mostly because there is little collective perspective of the piece. Ask the Minnesota Orchestra to play, say, any Brahms Symphony, and they'll happily fall into a groove - everyone knows how they fit in with everyone else, everyone knows what to listen for, everyone knows where the challenging passages are, everyone knows the variations of tempi. Given a less familiar work, there is a shallower collective understanding to fall back on, making an orchestra more reliant on the conductor, which presents me with more work to maintain ensemble.

But the benefits far outweigh this challenge, because a less familiar piece allows me to work with a much cleaner state. Without strong predispositions toward a piece, it is much easier to mold the musical architecture from my own perspective of the work. And this musical molding, of giving a piece a viewpoint that is both true to the intent of the composer and unique in its perspective, is the most fascinating work that I can do as a conductor. And working those details and making artistic discoveries is heightened when working on less familiar repertoire.

It's been an enormously rewarding week from a personal viewpoint so far; over the weekend, my second post on the topic will delve into the rehearsal process and the concerts themselves.