Speaker 1: This is Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's the thing,
Speaker 1: My chance to talk with artists, policymakers and performers, to
Speaker 1: hear their stories, what inspires their creations, what decisions change
Speaker 1: their careers, what relationships influenced their work. I began listening
Speaker 1: to classical music in my twenties. Job hunting as an
Speaker 1: actor in l A meant you'd be in your car
Speaker 1: three four hours a day. I drive around listening to
Speaker 1: the local classical stations, sometimes pulling over to call from
Speaker 1: my car phone to find out the name of the piece,
Speaker 1: who composed it, who performed it, and who conducted. While
Speaker 1: I was learning the difference between Maler and Mendelssohn. My
Speaker 1: guest today as Apeca Solomon, a Finish French horn player,
Speaker 1: also in his twenties, was making his conducting debut with
Speaker 1: the Philharmonia Orchestra in London. Today Solomon is their principal
Speaker 1: conductor and the new composer in residence at the New
Speaker 1: York Philip Manik for the next three years. And that's
Speaker 1: new because I, I mean, obviously, I've been composing for
Speaker 1: decades and since I started studying music, really, but but
Speaker 1: this is the first time I have an official position
Speaker 1: as a composer as opposed to being a conductor of
Speaker 1: some orchestra, and that for me, this is really fascinating,
Speaker 1: exciting for a lot of people was fascinating. Actually, was
Speaker 1: composition something that was the goal originally and conducting was accidental,
Speaker 1: I'm told correct, that's true. Yeah, I I started studying
Speaker 1: composition quite early in my teens. We started a group
Speaker 1: of young composers in Finland. I was born and raised
Speaker 1: in Helsinki, Finland. We had a group of young composers.
Speaker 1: Mongst Lindberg was one of them. He was actually the
Speaker 1: first composing composing in residents with the New York Philarmonica,
Speaker 1: another very well non composer. Now, so we started this
Speaker 1: group together, um so idealistic group of young tucks, kind
Speaker 1: of trying to change the world olden you know. We
Speaker 1: thought that new music is good for people, and therefore
Speaker 1: we took it out to you know, gas stations, prisons
Speaker 1: or people's homes. So and then it was one of
Speaker 1: those missions. Um. And it turned out that the real
Speaker 1: conductors at the time in Finland we're not interested in
Speaker 1: our stuff. So we felt that one of us has
Speaker 1: to conduct something has to be able to do it.
Speaker 1: So I was kind of voted um to become the
Speaker 1: conductor of the group because I had a lot of
Speaker 1: performance experience. I was a home player French home player,
Speaker 1: and I used to sub in in healthy orchestras in
Speaker 1: the opera at radio orchestra on zone, so I knew
Speaker 1: what it meant to be on stage and play and
Speaker 1: so on. So I started studying conducting just for this
Speaker 1: purpose basically, and so it was a fluke. And then
Speaker 1: I realized that I actually enjoyed it quite a bit,
Speaker 1: and it seemed to becoming natural you to me, and
Speaker 1: so on, m what did you enjoy about it? The people? Now,
Speaker 1: when I think about it, I wasn't so clear about
Speaker 1: that before, But now when I have long periods of
Speaker 1: of composing only, which is very lonely, of course, you know,
Speaker 1: you're you're alone, essentially, it's very slow. You know, you
Speaker 1: imagine something, then you kind of translate that dream into
Speaker 1: a sort of notation and so on, and it's a
Speaker 1: very slow processing and lonely, as I said, and and
Speaker 1: the energies a different kind of energy. It's the sort
Speaker 1: of marathon runner's energy, you know, the long haul you
Speaker 1: have to kind of pace yourself, and you have to
Speaker 1: be very very patient and so on. Whereas conducting, of course,
Speaker 1: it's a very intense thing socially. I mean, you are
Speaker 1: on stage with hundred other people, and in the rehearsals
Speaker 1: you're trying to focused them. You're trying to present your
Speaker 1: ideas about the piece in such a way that they
Speaker 1: not only accept them, but they they would willingly follow
Speaker 1: you to wherever you want to go, and so and
Speaker 1: and and I really enjoyed that aspect of it. The
Speaker 1: actual act of conducting, you know, standing there on the
Speaker 1: box waving the stick in the air, is not very
Speaker 1: interesting in my opinion. It's it's just like the tip
Speaker 1: of the iceberg. But then why is that person there?
Speaker 1: For those who don't understand that history of classical music,
Speaker 1: there wasn't always someone standing on a podium conducting, correct,
Speaker 1: That's right. Yeah. In the old days, I mean the
Speaker 1: very old days we were talking about Bach and Hayden
Speaker 1: and more Set and so on. The music was simple
Speaker 1: enough and it behaved in a sort of predictable enough
Speaker 1: way that the musicians could actually take care of themselves
Speaker 1: without somebody giving the beat, and you know, giving instructions
Speaker 1: as to where it course and so on. But then
Speaker 1: it started to become a little more complex with bet often,
Speaker 1: and you know bet often. Symphonies are already very difficult
Speaker 1: to perform without a conductor unless you're okay with a
Speaker 1: totally standard, middle of the road kind of approach. But
Speaker 1: if you want to do something, if you want to
Speaker 1: do something with the music, then there has to be
Speaker 1: somebody behind a concept. And then, of course, you know,
Speaker 1: we move on in history onto the big opera guys
Speaker 1: their Divagner zone, and then you know, onto Schraus, Bruckner, Mahler,
Speaker 1: you know, Stravinsky. That music cannot be played successful. It's impossible. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's impossible from the coordination point of view, but also
Speaker 1: the way it's composed, because the composer assumes that the
Speaker 1: interpretation has some kind of flexibility and ideas about the
Speaker 1: tempo and the pacing so on. Wagner for instances, all
Speaker 1: about the pacing. So what the conductor does is to
Speaker 1: handle the flow of time, um over an arch of
Speaker 1: I don't know, five hours, six hours on including the
Speaker 1: breaks of course. UM. So it's a it's a profession
Speaker 1: that became necessary. Um. And somehow Somewhere during this process,
Speaker 1: the conductor also became more visible, more of the center
Speaker 1: of the musical life and the musical musical process, the
Speaker 1: musical culture than the composer had been. And of course,
Speaker 1: if you think of the modern um recording industry, you know,
Speaker 1: with the with the LP and especially c D and
Speaker 1: now the tvds and what have you, had, the performer
Speaker 1: seems to be the center of all almost all attention,
Speaker 1: and the person who wrote the music, who in my opinion,
Speaker 1: is rather a big part of the chain, is actually
Speaker 1: not well recognized, yeah, but not not treated in the
Speaker 1: same sort of heroic way as as the conductors are.
Speaker 1: For instance, I had a really kind of illuminating experience
Speaker 1: in in l A some years ago. I was I
Speaker 1: was in a I was at Starbucks, actually queuing for
Speaker 1: my coffee, and there was a guy in front of
Speaker 1: me who asked where whether whether I was songs and
Speaker 1: I said, yes, I am. And he introduced himself and
Speaker 1: he said he was also a composer. And I said, um, okay, sorry,
Speaker 1: I don't recognize your name. I'm sorry, sorry about that.
Speaker 1: And he said, no, nobody does, but I write songs
Speaker 1: for pop stars and and he said I told me
Speaker 1: that he had written a couple of songs from Madonna
Speaker 1: and you know these huge names and his his name
Speaker 1: doesn't appear anywhere, and I thought, you know, this is symptomatic.
Speaker 1: So it's not only a classical music problem. I mean
Speaker 1: it's a problem across the board. There was some guy
Speaker 1: in London composer who calculated that if if a composer
Speaker 1: wants to get up to the minimum wage annual meanium
Speaker 1: wage of the UK, he or she needs like one
Speaker 1: point seven trillion downloads be here or or hitsp here.
Speaker 1: What I want to get back to is you are
Speaker 1: in London and you're at the phil Harmonia, correct, and
Speaker 1: you're playing the French horn and not anymore to know
Speaker 1: what what what? What were you playing at the moment
Speaker 1: you were asked to step up and conduct Isn't that
Speaker 1: when you were first asked to conducted? I was still
Speaker 1: playing you're playing those And who was the conductor at
Speaker 1: the time, Michael Tilson Thomas Tilson Thomas was conducting the
Speaker 1: phe Harmonia. Then yes, he was supposed to do the
Speaker 1: Third Symphony and what happened? I think he injured his
Speaker 1: elbow like a tennis elbow or something like that and
Speaker 1: had to pull out. And they called everybody on the
Speaker 1: planet with no success, obviously, and then they ended up
Speaker 1: with me, who was completely unknown. I had an agent
Speaker 1: who worked with a few artists, but his main business
Speaker 1: was in golf accessory uh and he operated out of
Speaker 1: a golf course in a smallish city of in Finland
Speaker 1: when nobody spoke English and zones so forth, so it
Speaker 1: took a little while for the messages to get through.
Speaker 1: I had had a long night with my pals, composer
Speaker 1: pals when the call came in early in the morning.
Speaker 1: So it's this guy from the golf course saying that
Speaker 1: the Philimonia wants you to contact Marla three and I
Speaker 1: told him to disappear in using expressions I will not
Speaker 1: repeat here public radio. Yes absolutely, And he called back
Speaker 1: a couple of hours later, when I was already talkable,
Speaker 1: and said, okay, here's the deal. So do you want
Speaker 1: to do it? And I thought, okay, So if it
Speaker 1: goes well, fine, if it doesn't, at least I can
Speaker 1: tell this to my grandchildren that I've done it once,
Speaker 1: or at least tried to. And then I went and
Speaker 1: did it. And that's how I became a full time
Speaker 1: conductor for a while. Your parents were not musicians, correct, No, No,
Speaker 1: My father was a businessman and my mom was mostly home.
Speaker 1: They loved music, listened to music. They went to concerts occasionally,
Speaker 1: but they didn't practice music in it and listened to
Speaker 1: recorded music. Yes, my father especially, he loved opera, and
Speaker 1: he loved Italian opera. So I had a lot of
Speaker 1: very d and Puccini playing when I was going up
Speaker 1: and had that affect you. I have had a very
Speaker 1: problematic relationship with Italian opera every since. This is quite normal.
Speaker 1: I guess you know it when your dad is really
Speaker 1: into something, when and then you grow up, you kind
Speaker 1: of decided not to be into the same thing. Um.
Speaker 1: I think it's a healthy reaction. So that's not just
Speaker 1: a finish thing. It's a no. I think it's the universal,
Speaker 1: it's a global And once he came home, he was
Speaker 1: very proud. He had bought a new recording of of
Speaker 1: Laboy m and he said it. He told me that
Speaker 1: he got it really cheaply. It was a special offer, um.
Speaker 1: And it was a Deutsche Berlin version of the Labom
Speaker 1: in German UM. And I grew up with this recording
Speaker 1: It's funny because when I hear it now in Italian
Speaker 1: it sounds all wrong. I can't listen to it in
Speaker 1: Italian because it it's it's it goes in German in
Speaker 1: my memory. And it's funny how we get conditioned in
Speaker 1: our child childhood and it never changes when you when
Speaker 1: you stepped up at the age of to conduct the
Speaker 1: Maler third with the Philharmonia, did you have a sense
Speaker 1: like what did you do that? You think? How did
Speaker 1: it go? What do you attribute to that it was
Speaker 1: so successful? Because everything I read they talk about you
Speaker 1: becoming an overnight sensation as a conductor as a result
Speaker 1: of this performance while you were doing it, where you're
Speaker 1: saying yourself, Wow, this is really going well, where you
Speaker 1: don't think about that. I think that the critical moment
Speaker 1: is the first minute in the first rehearsal with the orchestra.
Speaker 1: I mean most of my colleagues can actually say the
Speaker 1: same thing. I'm sure that when you meet a new orchestra,
Speaker 1: especially when you're young and you don't have that routine
Speaker 1: how to deal with with people you don't know, Um,
Speaker 1: that's the moment when you don't know how it's going
Speaker 1: to go. Um. And with the Philomonia. I felt this
Speaker 1: connection in a really strange way, and it's very hard
Speaker 1: to explain. It's something it's something that happens between people.
Speaker 1: I mean even in your private life, and you meet
Speaker 1: body and you know from day one or the first
Speaker 1: second actually that this person is going to be a
Speaker 1: very important influence, positive constructive influence in my life. And
Speaker 1: the opposite happens as well. All the flags go up
Speaker 1: and you know that you you you have to stay
Speaker 1: away from this person no matter what. And you're very
Speaker 1: instinctual that way. Well we all are all are. I
Speaker 1: think it's a it's a biological thing you know that
Speaker 1: you know has to do with survival and you know,
Speaker 1: the forming internal relations which tribe but you know, keeping
Speaker 1: the cohesion of the society and isn't that um. But
Speaker 1: so with the Philimonia, I felt straight away that wow,
Speaker 1: these guys seem to not only accept me, but but
Speaker 1: they seem to follow me and kind of willingly. UM.
Speaker 1: And I was quite an experience because it was the
Speaker 1: famous Philimoni Orchestra and the conductor was recorded the multi
Speaker 1: at that time, and you know, it's like a deal um.
Speaker 1: And I have had these kinds of experiences later on
Speaker 1: in life as well, and they they it never fails,
Speaker 1: the mechanism might. I felt the same kind of thing
Speaker 1: in l A a year after the Philomonia concept when
Speaker 1: I met them for the first time, and I had
Speaker 1: no idea what to expect. That it was my first
Speaker 1: trip to the US ever, so it was a culture shock.
Speaker 1: And of course I start out in l A, which
Speaker 1: is even more of a shocked than anything else would
Speaker 1: have been. And then I can say that again, yeah,
Speaker 1: And then I stepped in front of the band and
Speaker 1: and and they're terribly nice. But but more but more
Speaker 1: than that, you know, like connecting straight away and and
Speaker 1: that for me is the very essential thing about making music.
Speaker 1: And and with both focus with l A and the Philimonia,
Speaker 1: I've sometimes had this very strange experiences, you know, some
Speaker 1: kind of communication that is beyond certainly beyond words, but
Speaker 1: also beyond gestures in a way. And I'm thinking of
Speaker 1: something I can I can swear that they do it
Speaker 1: before I've done it, so that they this this kind
Speaker 1: of fine tuning, fine tuned trust in each other in
Speaker 1: a way, and it has to be mutual otherwise that's work.
Speaker 1: So after the performance of the Maler in London. You
Speaker 1: were twenty six years old. When does your first assignment
Speaker 1: come as a music director of ensemble? I started out
Speaker 1: in Stockholm with the Swedish Radio Orchestra. Soon after this
Speaker 1: un did the job you wanted. It was the best
Speaker 1: orchestra in Scandinavia at the time and and still is
Speaker 1: one of the very best, if not the best. And
Speaker 1: um and that was perfect for me because I I
Speaker 1: was in a in a culture that was familiar to me,
Speaker 1: I spoke the language, and still it was away from home.
Speaker 1: Was staying in the Scandinavian sphere? Did you want to
Speaker 1: stay there for the time? Thing? It felt like a
Speaker 1: very good idea because I I like the idea of
Speaker 1: being in a culture where no particular translation was necessary,
Speaker 1: and I understood the reactions with people, and they understood
Speaker 1: reactions of mine or the lack of lack of lack
Speaker 1: of reactions and um. And it was a very good
Speaker 1: orchestra and they were very nice people and um and
Speaker 1: the same kind of thing that there was a very
Speaker 1: sort of intuitive understanding people. People who have a prejudice,
Speaker 1: I suppose myself included that there's a Scandinavian soul and
Speaker 1: that they crave music of a certain type or key
Speaker 1: or do they want that not true? Did they want
Speaker 1: to hear everything? I'm not sure there's a Scandinavian soul.
Speaker 1: It's it's a it's a myth in many ways. Technically,
Speaker 1: if we look out from the finished perspective and try
Speaker 1: to decide who is who are the ones that are
Speaker 1: closest to us in you know, historically, traditionally, temperamentally, in
Speaker 1: every way, it's the sweet. Also, Finland was part of
Speaker 1: Sweden for six years. Um, so there's there's a lot
Speaker 1: of history, but still there's a fundamental difference in in
Speaker 1: how we behave in social life and um, the Sweets
Speaker 1: are very smooth, socially smooth, skillful to people. They work
Speaker 1: very well in groups. They they're very successful in everything
Speaker 1: they do. You know, they they are experts at selling
Speaker 1: their products globally and internationally so on. Um, and they're
Speaker 1: very brilliant in many ways. Finns. First of all, Finns
Speaker 1: don't speak much. I mean talking using more than the
Speaker 1: absolute minimum amount of words to get your mess it
Speaker 1: across is somehow considered being frivolous or you know, suspect
Speaker 1: or something like that. And yeah, some kind of you know,
Speaker 1: trying to achieve your goal through flattery or whatever. Um.
Speaker 1: I realized this. I saw this very clearly when when
Speaker 1: after some years in l A, I went back to
Speaker 1: my country house in Finland and went up jogging. And
Speaker 1: I had learned this habit of greeting everybody like you
Speaker 1: do in l A. You know, you're walking on the
Speaker 1: street and you just great, great people. Um. And I
Speaker 1: was greeting everyone, you know, every villager, and they looked
Speaker 1: at me like some kind of space aliens. What what
Speaker 1: has happened to this guy? He was perfectly normal a
Speaker 1: few years ago. Now he's been in America anyway, Now
Speaker 1: he's like this or what's rotic? What is this all about?
Speaker 1: Salmon is rooted in the United States. Two of his
Speaker 1: three children were born here. And I'd love to claim
Speaker 1: Salmon and as our very own, but I'd have to
Speaker 1: get in line. He's an international superstar, with seven honorary
Speaker 1: doctorates from four different countries. Be sure to explore the
Speaker 1: Here's the Thing archives. You can find my conversation with
Speaker 1: Alex and Jamie Bernstein, whose father, like Solomon, had a
Speaker 1: serendipitous debut as a conductor at a major concert hall.
Speaker 1: So he gets back to Carnegie Hall at you know,
Speaker 1: five in the morning and passes out, and then like
Speaker 1: an hour and a half later, the phone rings and
Speaker 1: it's Bruno Zerato of the New York Philharmonic saying, this
Speaker 1: is a kid, you have to go on this afternoon.
Speaker 1: And it was on the radio as a national broadcast.
Speaker 1: Take a listen at Here's the Thing dot org. This
Speaker 1: is Alec Baldwin and you were listening to Here's the Thing.
Speaker 1: In two thousand three, the Walt Disney Concert Hall, home
Speaker 1: to the l A Philharmonic, opened in downtown Los Angeles.
Speaker 1: The spaces internationally beloved for its design and its acoustics
Speaker 1: as a pack of someone in the music director of
Speaker 1: the orchestra at that time, Chris in the space when
Speaker 1: it opened. The project got started in the late eighties already,
Speaker 1: so I was involved. I was a music director designated
Speaker 1: from from So I started talking with Frank Garry already
Speaker 1: then and um, but they had started the fundraising and
Speaker 1: the first donation came in and in already I believe, so,
Speaker 1: so it really was a fifteen year project. Um. And
Speaker 1: then we started developing the idea and it came to
Speaker 1: a halt a couple of times, um for financial ways,
Speaker 1: financial and political like garious conception. It was not so
Speaker 1: much about that, but it was just things that happened,
Speaker 1: like the riots in ninety two in l A and
Speaker 1: you know somehow around King. Yeah, when when you realize
Speaker 1: that the society was kind of falling apart, and and
Speaker 1: and and everybody realized that they were these huge tensions
Speaker 1: and that the kind of peace and and rule of
Speaker 1: law was just a base of thin layer on top
Speaker 1: of it all. So I think everybody felt that that
Speaker 1: there are huge problems that need need to be need
Speaker 1: to be addressed. And at that point, to even speak
Speaker 1: about building a new concert hole in downtown l A
Speaker 1: felt like the wrong thing to do. And I think
Speaker 1: it a new police station maybe, yeah, rather some you know,
Speaker 1: more constructive ideas as to how to alleviate the situation,
Speaker 1: how to make things better and so on. Um. But
Speaker 1: then things moved on luckily later in the in the nineties,
Speaker 1: and I think the turning point was in when the
Speaker 1: Philharmonic did a month long residence in Paris and and
Speaker 1: lots of people came to hear their own orchestra playing
Speaker 1: in a great concert Hall in Paris to shutly and
Speaker 1: and then that I think that was the thing that
Speaker 1: changed the whole thing, that all of a sudden people
Speaker 1: realized that a musical experience is really as some of
Speaker 1: its parts. And one very important thing is that the
Speaker 1: space where the Oxtrad place. And if it doesn't sound good,
Speaker 1: there's little hope. What was it like to live so
Speaker 1: many years in Los Angeles coming from where you came from,
Speaker 1: and just culturally I loved it. I think it's a
Speaker 1: really great place to live, and it takes a little
Speaker 1: while to get used to it. To be honest, it's
Speaker 1: allows the place to visit because in in two weeks
Speaker 1: you're only confused and you don't get it, but it
Speaker 1: really does grow on you and um and also for
Speaker 1: me as a as an artist and as a as
Speaker 1: a person, it was really incredibly helpful to be away
Speaker 1: from the sort of European counton, you know, the sort
Speaker 1: of arrogant European intellectual canon that you know in the
Speaker 1: music world. And of course when I started out in
Speaker 1: l A, I had this some kind of residue from
Speaker 1: this European thing that okay, I'm here too to bring
Speaker 1: some kind of culture to elevate you. Yeah, this culture
Speaker 1: is medicine kind of thing which is vile. Thank god
Speaker 1: I'm here, Yes, aren't you lucky? Um? And it was
Speaker 1: an interesting process because I was talking about things, you know,
Speaker 1: the way we used to in in your bost days,
Speaker 1: and you know, with this kind of all kinds of
Speaker 1: intellectual constructs and you know, the historic necessity of a
Speaker 1: tonal music and listen that. And people were very nice,
Speaker 1: they said, oh, yeah, great, interesting, But how does it sound?
Speaker 1: Or asking these questions that are the obvious questions that
Speaker 1: everybody should ask, but we we weren't for some reason
Speaker 1: asking so what that sounds great? But um, what does
Speaker 1: it do to me? How? How will I feel? One?
Speaker 1: Is the actual effect and impact of what you're doing
Speaker 1: on me? And and I couldn't quite answer to those questions.
Speaker 1: And and this started a big process where I kind
Speaker 1: of rethought my values, my life and my artistic hearth.
Speaker 1: While you're in Los Angeles, yeah, while I was there.
Speaker 1: And I describe that process. Um, it's hard to describe
Speaker 1: it in words. But but what happened composition wise was
Speaker 1: that I had come to a drought. For a few years.
Speaker 1: I hadn't written anything, Um, and I was blaming the
Speaker 1: conducting schedule. I was. I was conducting around the world,
Speaker 1: and I was learning all that repertoire, you know, all
Speaker 1: of a sudden, I was doing all the betomin symphonies
Speaker 1: and the Brahms and the Bruckner and god knows what.
Speaker 1: So I was I spent lots of hours in front
Speaker 1: of the score buried. But it was not only about
Speaker 1: the lack of time. It was it was more like
Speaker 1: a crisis. I didn't know what to write and how
Speaker 1: to write. And I had this like a dichotomy. Um
Speaker 1: that the music I loved playing and performing was not
Speaker 1: like the music I wrote. Um, I love playing the
Speaker 1: the big lash stuff by you know, Racha, Schraus and
Speaker 1: Maler and Bruckner and straviing skincy bellies and all that.
Speaker 1: I love that resonant sound of symphony orchestra and the
Speaker 1: the fact that when a hundred people played full throttle,
Speaker 1: it's more thrilling than almost anything else in the world.
Speaker 1: To witness that energy coming at you, it's more thrilling
Speaker 1: than anything in the world, and almost anything anything. I agree.
Speaker 1: Thank you. I'm with you on that. Thank you. And
Speaker 1: the music I was writing at the time was not
Speaker 1: like that. It was because I was still in the
Speaker 1: European modernist um kind of box straight jacket rather where
Speaker 1: so many things were forbidden. And it sounds utterly ridiculous
Speaker 1: I'm here telling you what was forbidden, because there was
Speaker 1: no particular body that was doing the forbidding. But it
Speaker 1: was just like it was considered to be wrong to
Speaker 1: write a melody. It was considered to be wrong too,
Speaker 1: to use pulse. It was considered to be absolutely wrong
Speaker 1: to do something that sounds like a modulation moving from
Speaker 1: one key to another. And you didn't have anything like that.
Speaker 1: So finally I get to a point in l A
Speaker 1: with the sort of newly found freedom. I think that's
Speaker 1: the thing about Southern California, the freedom, the sort of
Speaker 1: um openness of the culture, that curiosity. You know, UM
Speaker 1: many colleagues. I've been talking to composers and other artists,
Speaker 1: people like Peter Sellers and Bill Viola, John Adams. They
Speaker 1: all say the same thing that coming to southern Southern California,
Speaker 1: or California rather, was essential for them to became the
Speaker 1: artists they wanted to be, or had had the potential
Speaker 1: to be. When the time comes to create the schedule
Speaker 1: for a given season. What factors go into that beyond
Speaker 1: availability of artists or whatever? Is it all you do?
Speaker 1: You sit down and people just take dictation, You say,
Speaker 1: I want to play this and this and this and this,
Speaker 1: or their board influences. It's a it's a very complex process, actually,
Speaker 1: because I think it would be irresponsible, irresponsible for the
Speaker 1: music director to dictate every program according to his or
Speaker 1: her tastes. Because at the end of the day, this
Speaker 1: is a public institution. We are serving the public, and
Speaker 1: and and and a symphony orchestra has to be and
Speaker 1: is a constructive force in the community. And and therefore
Speaker 1: it has to cater to more than one taste, and
Speaker 1: and it has to find the balance between leading and
Speaker 1: satisfying the needs. But also you kind of gauge the
Speaker 1: reactions after every concept, And you know I did in
Speaker 1: my years in la I did about thousand concerts with them,
Speaker 1: so so I learned to read the reaction quite well,
Speaker 1: I think, and and I I think that towards the end,
Speaker 1: especially the audience was quite proud of the fact that
Speaker 1: they are the cool audience. You know, they they can
Speaker 1: take all this stuff. You know, they are comfortable with
Speaker 1: new music. They are comfortable with less known works, but
Speaker 1: also they love the Jakovs, they love their you know,
Speaker 1: very direct commended and there's nothing absolutely nothing wrong with that.
Speaker 1: When seats open up inside the ensemble itself described that
Speaker 1: process of how those seats are filled? Is it a
Speaker 1: committee typically of of of the orchestra itself? Do you
Speaker 1: have an input into that? Every orchestra has a slightly
Speaker 1: different process. What was it like a lost But first
Speaker 1: of all, they announced the opening in in publications, you know,
Speaker 1: the UM musical publications and and on the internet and
Speaker 1: so on, and they get applications. In these days, a
Speaker 1: major US orchestra gets at least hundred and fifty applications
Speaker 1: for one position. If the positions are like principle player
Speaker 1: or something like that, they might get three hundred or
Speaker 1: five hundred insane numbers. In any case, so there's a
Speaker 1: there's an auditions committee that listens to the candidates. Some
Speaker 1: orchestras screened them based on the CVS and just invite
Speaker 1: a smaller number of people to play. Some orchestras listen
Speaker 1: to everybody. But in any any event, the committee elected
Speaker 1: committee sits there and listens to everybody who play behind
Speaker 1: the screen, so there are no extra musical issues at play,
Speaker 1: UM and the and for the final round, usually the
Speaker 1: music director joins them for the final round. They then
Speaker 1: vote and recommend a number of players, mostly like five
Speaker 1: or six, for the music director to choose from. The
Speaker 1: music director does indeed choose, yes. But but you know,
Speaker 1: this is also something where I think it makes a
Speaker 1: lot of sense to trust the instincts of the players,
Speaker 1: the colleagues, because they are the ones who actually sit
Speaker 1: next to this finalists. How do you know which one
Speaker 1: they favor? Well, it's they've told you. There's a discussion.
Speaker 1: There's a discussion. And then quite often I used to
Speaker 1: invite a couple of people to play with the Oxford
Speaker 1: for X number of weeks to see how they fit.
Speaker 1: Change And sometimes you know, people are doing individual people
Speaker 1: are just not tuned into collaborating and and so on.
Speaker 1: So and this this no way to discover this until
Speaker 1: you you've seen it. During the time you were in
Speaker 1: Los Angeles, how, if at all, was there any frequency
Speaker 1: in which people tried to co opt you, especially with
Speaker 1: your success as a composer into creating film score. I
Speaker 1: had a couple of discussions with a couple of people directors,
Speaker 1: but but it never materialized. And and I know, were
Speaker 1: you open to the idea? Yes, yes, I find fascinating,
Speaker 1: especially when I hear a great film score by a
Speaker 1: great film composer. It it really is. It's an up form.
Speaker 1: It really is an art form. But then when I
Speaker 1: talked to my friends in the film business and they
Speaker 1: tell me about the schedules, you know, like I think
Speaker 1: James Newton Howard took over the King Kong project four
Speaker 1: weeks before the film was supposed to be finished, and
Speaker 1: he worked more than two hours of music in in
Speaker 1: three and a half weeks. And I said, well, did
Speaker 1: you sleep? He said, now, ye, that ideal. And that's
Speaker 1: a skill. I mean to be able to do that
Speaker 1: and and deliver like highest quality film music gets. It's
Speaker 1: a skill, and I'm not not sure I have it.
Speaker 1: Many conductors, many people in the classical repertoire, some of
Speaker 1: them a bit older now, have tried their hand to
Speaker 1: varying degrees as composers and had some success. Some pieces
Speaker 1: they've done are are performed and are admired. Why do
Speaker 1: you think some of your colleagues don't get the traction
Speaker 1: with their work that you have had well lots of reasons.
Speaker 1: I I believe first of all, our era, um is
Speaker 1: that of specialists. You know, everything is getting more and
Speaker 1: more specific. Everyone gets as small as small as segment
Speaker 1: of the full process. And um, and if some is
Speaker 1: trying to do more than one thing, that is immediately
Speaker 1: suspicious somehow. UM. You know, if you think of say chocolate,
Speaker 1: When I was a kid, I went to a supermarket
Speaker 1: and bought a chocolate bar. Now I would go to
Speaker 1: a you know, specialist chocolate late and I would choose
Speaker 1: between beans from beans from the Jap chocolate and there
Speaker 1: would be like six beans as opposed to sugar or whatever.
Speaker 1: And and everything is just becoming more and more and
Speaker 1: more specific. Um. So I think the same process happens
Speaker 1: in in culture as well. The idea of covering a
Speaker 1: bigger segment of the entire process is not popular um
Speaker 1: for some reason, I don't know why. UM. This happens
Speaker 1: with builders, you know, like people in construction work. You know,
Speaker 1: people specialize in in smaller and smaller parts of the
Speaker 1: building process. And then you have to have like eight
Speaker 1: specialists to do your house instead of having one or
Speaker 1: two guys in the past who would do everything and
Speaker 1: and I think it has to do with that. The
Speaker 1: other thing is most of mundane, I think it. You know,
Speaker 1: in order to be a composer, you have to compose.
Speaker 1: I you have to set aside the time and in
Speaker 1: my case, I made the decision that I conduct only
Speaker 1: six months a year or less and the rest is
Speaker 1: for composing something you worked out. Yeah, this needs planning,
Speaker 1: you know, and and of course an inspiration and couldn't
Speaker 1: And you have to have management. You have have to
Speaker 1: have people who support you in this um and of
Speaker 1: course you know, to be totally you need isolation. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you need to be in one place and and um
Speaker 1: and also you know, conducting is is more lucrative from
Speaker 1: certainly from the financial point of view, but but also
Speaker 1: you know, you get this service, you fly first class
Speaker 1: and you stay nice hot star. You're a star. And
Speaker 1: people clap when you come in. I mean the clap
Speaker 1: when you come in. Well, well by definition they clap,
Speaker 1: and mostly they clap after the show. Also, so it's
Speaker 1: it's okay. Composer is just sitting there, you know, uh,
Speaker 1: and long days and quite often nothing different lives. It's
Speaker 1: a different life. I had an experienced many years ago.
Speaker 1: I was in Paris invited to they did the French
Speaker 1: Radio did a festival of young then young European composer's work,
Speaker 1: and they played a piece of Mind, and and I
Speaker 1: went to hear the concert. I couldn't go to the rehearsals,
Speaker 1: and and they had booked I guess a perfectly fine
Speaker 1: little hotel close to the radio, French radio, and I'm
Speaker 1: checking in with my wife and and I get really
Speaker 1: sort of annoyed as look at this piece of you
Speaker 1: know what, how can they expect anybody, anybody to stay
Speaker 1: in a place like this. And she looks at me
Speaker 1: and says, shut up. You're here as a composure, This
Speaker 1: is composed life. You're not here as a conductor. So
Speaker 1: just suck it up. Were there were zero piece you
Speaker 1: wrote that that came out of you more spontaneously, When
Speaker 1: that just came flowing out of you. It's always different,
Speaker 1: It's always different. It's just slow. This is my experience it.
Speaker 1: And you cannot make make it go faster. It just
Speaker 1: takes the time it needs. And then sometimes a pieces
Speaker 1: comes out pretty much as it should, and it sounds
Speaker 1: as it should in the first rehearsal, and then I change,
Speaker 1: maybe a up, a little dynamics or something, but that's it.
Speaker 1: And then with some other pieces they I'm not born
Speaker 1: right somehow, and and I take them back and fix
Speaker 1: and modify and change things, and then played again, still
Speaker 1: not good. And then in some cases this process has
Speaker 1: gone on for a couple of years. In some cases
Speaker 1: I've been able to fix it and you know, get
Speaker 1: to a result that I wanted to have in the
Speaker 1: first place. And in some cases I just gave up.
Speaker 1: I thought, okay, this is it, Watson all you know,
Speaker 1: this is the way it came out, and I'll I'll
Speaker 1: try again. Do you yourself ever get overwhelmed by a
Speaker 1: piece when you're performing it? Even now? Do you yourself
Speaker 1: even find I mean, I have had other conductors say
Speaker 1: to me, I tried my best to leave the tears
Speaker 1: for the audience. But do you find sometimes even you
Speaker 1: get crushed by the music you're playing? It does happen?
Speaker 1: It does happen. Give me an example, if you will,
Speaker 1: um there are two kinds of occasions. I think that there's,
Speaker 1: you know, the expectation rewards cycle, where you know, there
Speaker 1: are some spots in some works that I find so
Speaker 1: unbelievable that when I'm conducting, I'm not hurrying exactly, but
Speaker 1: I can't wait to get to that spot. And it
Speaker 1: does it well some modulations, for instance, you know, like
Speaker 1: in Brookness seven in a slow movement, when the the
Speaker 1: big combination of the adagio where the whole orchestra falls
Speaker 1: onto a C major chord, and it's just overwhelming, and
Speaker 1: it's an experience which is physical and emotional and everything,
Speaker 1: and it's almost sexual because it's spiritual. Yeah, it's it's everything,
Speaker 1: and and it's very hard not to be very, very
Speaker 1: moved by this. And it's funny because I've conducted this
Speaker 1: piece I don't know, thirty or forty times and over
Speaker 1: the years, and still it does it every time. But
Speaker 1: then there's a different category, which is more like it
Speaker 1: doesn't have to do with the actual piece so much,
Speaker 1: but it's more like the it's called it flow. It's
Speaker 1: it's those moments. And this is not it doesn't happen
Speaker 1: every day or every week even but they sometimes I
Speaker 1: experienced this kind of flow state where I feel that
Speaker 1: I'm one with not only the piece, but also with
Speaker 1: the orchestra and somehow in some way with the audience
Speaker 1: also that we create this kind of ocean or a river,
Speaker 1: and I'm just like riding on a wave. And I'm
Speaker 1: this sounds terribly in your age, but I can't really
Speaker 1: describe it very well. It's I'm receiving and not giving,
Speaker 1: and I'm writing on something which is my much much
Speaker 1: more powerful than myself, and those are incredible moments, and
Speaker 1: but I cannot call them, you know. It's it's there's
Speaker 1: no way to guarantee that this happens, and when it happens,
Speaker 1: there's nothing like it as a peck of Salon in
Speaker 1: the rare combination of conductor and composer. He said recently
Speaker 1: that he's finally got the balance right A fifty fifty split.
Speaker 1: To see Salmon at work, check out the orchestra app
Speaker 1: he created for the iPad. This is Alec Baldwin and
Speaker 1: you're listening to here's the thing