(00:00:00) Reforms and push for a looser Federation of the Soviet republics the party Congress voted to require the politburo to consist of the general secretary his deputy and the first secretaries of the parties of the 15 Republic's the change guarantees that the small group of primarily Russian men who traditionally ruled the Soviet Union would be replaced by largely pro-reform non Russian Communists. The stock market is off today in light trading analysts say the Traders are finding little inspiration in the news to prompt them to make big commitments one way or the other as of 11:30 Central Time. The Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 1.24 at 2903 Point 71 Transportation index up just over five and a half points at 11:46 53 and the utilities index down one and a half points. You're listening to midday on Minnesota Public Radio a member supported broadcast service. This is K. No, W 1330 Minneapolis st. Paul in the Twin Cities a cloudy Sky 74 degrees. A reminder that midday is made possible today by Metropolitan Federal Bank serving the nation with stability trust and dependability and that NPR's coverage of regional public policy issues is supported by a grant from the Northwest area foundation. It's now 30 seconds pass 12 o'clock noon Stephen Smith with you here on midday and our studio guests joining us now Michael Steinberg, the new artistic director of the Minnesota Orchestra is Viennese Summerfest which opens on Wednesday and Georgia fleas on has the concertmaster of the Minnesota Orchestra who also happens to be related to mr. Steinberg their husband and wife. Welcome. Thank you. We will be opening the phone lines for listener questions and I might as well give the number out now, so people can get ready one 865 to 9700 is the toll-free number one 865 to 1900. That's for anywhere outside the Twin Cities where you can hear us in the Twin Cities metro area to 276 thousand is the number to call to to 76 thousand our topics today Summerfest the Minnesota Orchestra classical music the world of Music anything are His mind like to throw at her guests. Why don't we start off since you're both newcomers to Minnesota? Why don't we start off with a bit of a resume if you will where where you're from and what brings you here? Well, what brought me here was Georgia actually she got a job first as concertmaster the orchestra. She had known. Well, you really have to tell that story. But anyway, I tagged along after her and now I have a sort of funny kind of life in that I work part-time for the Minnesota Orchestra and I've still kept part of my old job at the San Francisco Symphony where I had been the previous 10 years. Hmm. So you're should doing a shuttle diplomacy kind of shuttle diplomacy. Yes. I do program planning here and some pre-concert talks and in San Francisco, I still write the but I still write the program note for them, which was can be done long distance, but I go out there few times a year to to do some pre-concert talks and and your life before (00:03:00) Minnesota. Well, it was nine. Years in San Francisco is the associate concertmaster there and prior to that I had been kind of I had rather checkered kind of life before that got sort of squared away when I went to San Francisco, but I had been a member of the Chicago Symphony for a little bit of time and then I'd gone fled from that and went into chamber music and then to a smaller sort of chamber orchestra life, which I think was my way of getting my chops a little bit better in shape to go on to the next chapter of life. And and it was really a very invigorating one in San Francisco those nine years. (00:03:38) Well, how does how does musically San Francisco compared to to Minnesota in the Twin Cities? How are you finding it? I'm finding it fine. And there's more to do here more to listen to more to get involved in not only music. Of course, I'm thinking of, you know, the theater and visual arts and stuff like that. There's far more here than I could possibly find time to attend to I think it's there's probably I would guess more music going on here in the Twin Cities than in any other place between the coasts and it's tremendously Rich sort of activity. I mean, there are certain things in San Francisco mint has this huge glamorous Opera Company, there is more visiting stuff that comes through there more visiting orchestras on tour and that kind of thing but the Homegrown stuff here is there's so much of that and on a really really high level and of course the wonderful luxury of having two full-time orchestras here, I mean us and st. Paul which is a fabulous institution, I think How do you find (00:04:44) it Well, I was going to say in Echo to that that when one thinks of how much spare time when has any way to just go out and take advantage of whatever is happening culturally around them. I have never found myself to be lacking or wanting of really first, you know, top-notch theater and music and a lot of friends have come through and look in this past year that we that we are that we've been here visiting musicians and it's wonderful because Saint Paul brings in that whole additional Cavalcade of soloists and conductors at each year. And really I think we find it very stimulating to be here. I anticipated that if I have a lot of relatives here, well, I'm sure listening in and I fight and I'm ready to calm and poised at their phones and their you know, I knew about Minnesota and it's through actually through this radio station a lot of it too. I mean starting with the same Palm Sunday morning shows and so weird. I think really plenty stimulated (00:05:46) great so you can blame us. That's right our guest today on midday Michael Steinberg the artistic director of the Minnesota Orchestra Summerfest and Georgia fleas honest the Minnesota orchestra concert master and they're here to take your phone calls at 2276 thousand in the Twin Cities 2276 thousand 1-800-621-3362. Five two nine seven hundred Michael. Tell us a bit about Summer Fest this year. It's entering its second decade. Its you're going in a slightly different direction this year. I would I would think yeah, not more than slightly. We've kept the basic formula because that evolved over the years and everyone seems to have decided it works really well and I think what's different is the detail some of the flavor there some new faces and profiles and backs on stage new soloist new. Does but the what and the other thing that we've done this year something that amazed me usually the festival's had a theme of some kind of defect I guess it has had every year and I was very astonished to discover when we were casting around for ideas of what to do with this year that of in all the ten years. We've never had one that focused on Vienna's most eminent musical citizen Beethoven. And so that seemed to kind of natural thing to do this year. So that's kind of what we're looking at and we developed I think this came about unintentionally, but once we sought developing I decide we should take advantage of it. We have a kind of sub-theme in Paganini who was such a fascinating figure means of there isn't really anybody in classical music today that you compare them to I mean, it's more like the sort of you know what Sinatra was 40 years ago or What some of the most powerfully magnetic rock performers probably are today and who was certainly active in Vienna around Beethoven's time and he wrote a lot of music but also people have written a lot of other other composers written a lot of music based on his stuff. So that's kind of evolved as a sort of secondary current that runs through the Festival then other than that it's usually there, you know, you set out to make programs that are as attractive as possible as interesting as possible for the orchestra for the players as well as for the audience and that a practical, you know things that actually it is possible to rehearse to prepare properly in the time available and all of that. So well, we'll get more details on the Summerfest as the our goes along but let's go to the phones now. We have one person standing by. Hello. What's your question, please? Hello there. Are you addressing me? I am indeed ma'am. You're on the air. They were speaking of finding Minneapolis. And st. Paul the whole area very stimulating and I want to do I just want to convey how stimulating we have found them and they've added a great deal to the whole Ambience of our area and I appreciate having them here. Well, that's very nice to hear. Thank you very (00:09:02) much. This is not a relative either. (00:09:05) It was very very well. Put let's go to our next caller. Hello. You're on the air, please. What's your question? I want to give my love to George and Michael. Yeah, (00:09:14) that sounds like a relative to relative great pride and love Georgia. I'm so happy to hear your voice. I don't see you often, but I'm happy to hear your voice. Oh (00:09:26) now you're really in trouble. Well, let's see if we can get some questions now on classical music and Summerfest etcetera 2276 thousand phone lines are open in the Twin Cities at 2276 thousand one 865 to 9700 is the toll-free number elsewhere. The topic can be on anything the orchestra classical music music in general Our Guest today, Michael Steinberg and Georgia fleas honest. Is there a danger is there any danger in a you know something of a loaded question there's a danger in whatever in focusing of of identifying, you know one composer for something like like the Summerfest depends on the composer with Beethoven. You have enough scope that there's enough variety. I mean with Beethoven, of course, there is also the danger that he is so omnipresent. You begin to wonder why you need a festival rent because these pieces get played all the time, but on the other hand, I think a lot of what makes for nice programming has to do with how you combine things and the way pieces highlight and show up each other. And the other thing I would say is that we found that there is at least something of a special time efest audience that doesn't entire over the entirely overlap with our wintertime subscription audience and to a lot of those people a lot of this Repertory is going to be very fresh and fair instance the idea of actually doing all nine of the Beethoven Symphonies within the festival as we're doing I think that's exciting and I think that's something special for this audience and but you know, when we focus on Beethoven, it isn't that we do only I haven't really counted out, you know, how much you know what the percentages of how many hours how many hours actually of Beethoven is compared to how many hours everybody else but it's a question of putting it in sort of creative creating the context of having pieces. That would not be the way they are were not for you know had those other composers have not had Beethoven to lean. Sorry that sentences going to Pieces but let it be later in the yeah hadn't had Beethoven to lean on or the people that Beethoven leaned on. And I like Mozart and Haydn for example, and you know, what else was going on around that time. If you have that there that helps you like Paganini, for example that helps you to see what makes Beethoven stand out what makes him be special. So but anyway, I think Beethoven certainly has enough scope to allow you not to get in a rut. Okay, there are some people standing by with questions. Let's go to the next caller. Hello. You're on the air. Yes. I wonder if Miss buzanis would describe her version of what the concert masters job is how much of it is Artistic Direction how much is relations with management and other things I might not have thought of (00:12:13) hey, well, I don't know if we can get into all of those but well it's that's a very breathy topic and I would say having had one year of actual experience with it and nine years of sitting two feet from it. I can sort of give you some sort of Capsule on it. I think that the influence is is Artistic just by the sheer nature of being able to exemplify always at every moment. The direction of the the conductor's intentions the your own personal intention which comes from a lot of experience and that experience is of course called upon in varying degrees depending on the conductor's freedom and or lack of concern with certain things that are going on very specifically that you suddenly have to be very concerned about because you can sense that maybe the orchestra slipping or that it's it's another words. It's a game of tremendous flexibility and of course total unpredictability and I think that's one of the reasons why I find the orchestra probably will always find it a very stimulating environment. Although I know that's not something that immediately readily always comes to the mind of a lot of orchestral players and I think that depends on your attitude and your relationship to music and I That the other aspects of involvement politically are really endless because it's a huge community and its laws and rules. A lot of them are in a way sort of traditionally passed on to us. I have a feeling that now the modern Orchestra is so well organized through a lot of it through Union regulations that we've sort of evolved through negotiations and contracts. But of course to come into a new situation you have to for me I had to really acquire a relationship with a hundred other people and their their particular vein of expressing themselves their own philosophies and I feel very fresh with this Orchestra still and Incredibly enthusiastic about the years ahead and working with them as an artistic colleague. The question is I said is endless so I think I'll just sort of leave it as having touched. Well, you mentioned (00:14:32) politics does gender come into the politics there. I don't know much about this end of the business, but does it make a difference to be a concert Master? He's also a woman is it harder is it is there any chauvinism (00:14:45) involved? If so, it's quite invisible to me. I mean, I I've lived in the orchestra all my life. So I mean in a certain sense the the day in and day out Dynamics are such that I know them and I think that my attitude about women in music is that I don't see a problem. I mean, I've seen it in history that they're just too many instances where it's a Artistry is non gender and creativity is in terms of instrumentalists and singers and those of us who are re-creators is not bound by gender and I think that the job is if anything I've Apprentice into the job and if I wasn't that I had that experience I wouldn't be there it was not for gender that I was brought into the job (00:15:33) clearly though. I think it's worth pointing out that it's new. I mean the way when you were appointed you were in effect the first person's first woman to become concertmaster of a major Orchestra in this country and filed with a whole lot then quickly following Detroit in Atlanta in the Metropolitan Opera, but this is this is very new (00:15:52) development. Yeah. I think the it's interesting that the last in the last seven eight years the the pressure against the wall of not having had a woman in that chair has been mounting. There have been several orders that have had associate concert Masters who have been women and I think it was just a question of you know, one small leak in the dam and it was ready to it was ready to go and I have no sociological wisdom to say about this except that it's like anything else it was inevitable and Actually when you get out there and everything is said and done and you pick up your instruments to play the concert, you look across and you all you see is energy. You see great impulse you don't see necessarily the the highly defined Specialties of sex and sexuality or whatever and it's it's a collection of really really gifted people who were all there together who've spent many many hours of time, you know to really perfect what they're doing and that's that is just humanly a very stimulating environment to be in (00:17:00) Georgia who is honest and Michael Steinberg Our Guest today and other person is standing by with a question. Hello. You're on the air. (00:17:05) Thank you. I have a question for Miss. Please goddess, and pardon me. If this is a duplicate. My radio has been off for a few minutes. I hear that you are giving a concert in November for music in the park in st. Paul and we'll be premiering a piece by Aaron Curtis. And since I have a special interest in new music, I wonder if you could tell us a little bit about that and Especially tell us what you find interesting about. Mr. Curtis has work and what will be hearing on that concert. I'll hang up and listen. Thank you. Okay. Well, thanks for bringing up that that little bit of PR firm for a recital coming up. It's true. The concert is November 25th, which is the Sunday after Thanksgiving. And in fact, it's a preview warm up concert for New York debut. I'll be doing in December that concert was scheduled for this past spring but I had to postpone that because of my kin is developing some hand problems. But the concert here will include a commissioned work which is in fact part of the Schubert clubs sort of plan for these debut concerts and they have been in part the what you call it. The people that give money to have a Peace Commission the Commissioners Commissioners, excuse me blanking out. Anyway, the I chose Aaron because One piece in particular struck me very boldly about three or four years ago. P-- said he'd written for cello and voice which of a very close friend of mine premiered in New York with Dawn Upshaw and the Chalice was under a million off and it was a piece that that captured what I've always longed to have which is a very one-on-one relationship with a singer. I am extremely evolved as a player I think through the help of singing and the whole world of making music as a singer and the kinds of dramatic effects that singing lens instrumental playing and I the piece was so so convincing to me and so consummate as a blending of instrumental and vocal powers that I've he's named came to me right away. So I called him when this this wonderful opportunity was given to me by the Schubert club and I said Aaron, I'd love for you to write another piece for voice and instrument in this case violin and Through many conversations a long conversation because he's a very soft and slow speaker. We came up with the idea of a piece for baritone violin and then he felt that the text that he was that were sort of fermenting in his mind also would require having some percussion instruments. We now have peace for for percussion piano violin and baritone and the baritone will be Sanford Sylvan who was sung now I guess several times recital last year in st. Paul and he's he did the John Adams wound dresser with the Saint Paul chamber orchestra on their tour this past year. And as a person who I first came into contact with through Nixon in China and that work will be just I mean, I think a very stunning piece I've now had the music long enough to look at it and the texts are extremely stimulating and the program altogether is is a pretty off-the-wall program in that. It's it begins. The Ives third Sonata and then we go to the Curtis piece and then it concludes with the Nesco third Sonata not standard pieces that come up but pieces that are in a way sort of for me very personal launching pads for my psychosis and Neurosis as a musician. (00:20:44) So they fit the medically that way (00:20:46) they do. (00:20:49) Well, let's hope the audience can catch that too. Okay, great. Two two seven six thousand is the number to call in the Twin Cities area one 865 to 9700 toll-free anywhere else. We have another person standing by. Hello. You're on the air. What's your question, (00:21:01) please? I am wondering how I can find out what the English words are to Beethoven's Ninth Symphony. (00:21:07) Well, Probably the easiest way to find them is if you mean ahead of the concert, you can probably the easiest way to find them as in a record album. Any record album of the Ninth Symphony would give you the original German text and the English and if you come to our one of our concerts when we perform it at the end of July will have the text the original German text and the English translation of the program the gist of it being that Joy is a good thing and something that binds all human creatures together. It's kind of fascinating thing really because if you read the poem by itself, you'd almost have a hard time figuring why it would inspire a composer to something as extraordinary as it did in this case because it's a kind of Rowdy cheery Drinking Song really and and I think there's an interesting lesson them that I think it's always the important thing is not what we think of text that composes set. But what composers Event and this was one that had fascinated Beethoven all of his life around the time that he was 18 or 17 or something. He said that he wanted to set Schiller's Ode to Joy to music though. It took him another 40 some years before he got real and think the arithmetic there's right 30 some years, I guess before he got around to doing it. Another person is standing by with a question. Hello. Where are you calling from (00:22:32) please? I'm calling from Brainerd, mr. Steinberg and Hello. Yes. Go ahead, please. I'm calling from Brainerd and I am very interested in your new programming for Summerfest and we're going to 8 concerts good (00:22:51) but I was sort of (00:22:52) disappointed that Meister devoured is not conducting the Opera and I wonder does he have one on the program for the next season or can you tell me where he may be conducting Opera? (00:23:08) We were very disappointed to that. He felt that he was just you know, that that he really felt that for the sake of health and Sanity. He needed to just lie low this summer and we were very sorry to lose him from that in answer to your question. He will be conducting concert performance of Verdi's Falstaff in the Minnesota Orchestra season in that comes up in October. I guess I don't have the exact date with me. But anyway, it's know. Remember, I'm just been corrected. And other than that, I don't think he's doing any Opera in this country this year. You'd have to go to Holland I guess to track him down there. Okay, let's go to another caller. Hello. Where are you calling from please? I'm from st. Paul. And you question. My question is how many times I attend concerts and I'm embarrassed by the coughing in the audience. I think it's Minnesota's right to cough because of the weather. My question is this is a coughing any better or worth with Minnesota audience versus other audiences and if it is what can be done about it. Thank you. Now Lord, I think it's the coughing and sneezing question which we knew it. Yeah. I've had the impression actually that the coughing is less of a problem here than in many places. I mean, I think this with this audience has has better manners and better Larry angle control. Disciplined and many ideas. I know it can it can be it can be absolutely maddening and I've experienced it here too. But I've also an experienced I get less tense about silences in a piece of music here than I used to in San Francisco. For example in San Francisco. I absolutely knew that if there was, you know, a two-second magical silence and peace. That would be the moment that somebody would choose to turn his entire respiratory apparatus inside out and it seems very much. It seems very much better here, you know apropos of what you say about you know, that minnesotans have a right to cough. I mean you referring to the climate as I assumed we were I'm always very skeptical about that and because it seems to me that probably not more and I'm just inventing statistics. I mean the way statisticians do that, you know, probably not more than about 12 or 15 percent of all of the coffee. That you hear in a place like a concert hall our church or whatever. It may be is physically physiologically motivated inevitable unquenchable coughing most of it is restlessness and boredom and how much of these psychological causes how much of it do you think it's related to that Drive-In many of us which fortunately I've managed to suppress so far to do something completely outrageous in a room filled with people and yes, it's rather than Stand Up and Scream and Shout some people just just coffered Sonny's sublimated into coughing. Yo, I'm no doubts and it's those performers. I think it's I think it's worse. However, not necessarily here, but everywhere compared to you know, when I was ten years ago when I was going to concerts. Oh, yeah. I think that me the TV, I don't know if TV has something to do with it, but it seems to me people sort of feel like they're insulated now and they go to any performance. Yeah it sure. I mean the TV or any kind of home consumption of music or anything. Also, I mean you are there and if you cough you're not disturbing anybody except yourself or members of your immediate household or something like that and the people forget that you're sharing the space with 2,500 people, but it's not new. If you read letters of composers. I mean going back into the 19th century composers and musicians could performers always complain about noisy and inattentive and coughing audiences. And so maybe even more unruly who knows. Yeah. Oh and I mean in different kinds of ways, I mean they were completely different. I think probably if you came if you could take some early 19th century a particular 18th century musicians and move them into a 1990 Concert Hall. They would be amazed by the level of concentration and that they aren't, you know, refreshment vendors walking around and that there's much less talking that goes on. I mean maybe slightly more coughing people really don't Skinner chatter incessantly the way they used to and that that kind of stuff because the other thing they would be astonished by as that we don't applaud enough, you know that the you know that we have developed in the name of you know, good taste, you know, which is why I think one of the most destructive cultural forces that we have in the name of good taste. I mean some of these terrible ideas that it is a very Wicked thing to compare to applaud between movements of the symphony and it would make any 19th or 18th Century composer feel absolutely suicidal. If a symphony came first movement of the symphony came to an end and everybody just sat there poker-faced and then dead silence is I do think people are more or less timid on that issue here. (00:28:24) Um, there's a little more abandon here. I mean it's but it seems to always be directly related to something that has caused it to happen on stage. And I think I really do think that we've musicians are also extremely uptight about when it's right and when it's not right and how to behave when it happens and and yet I think all of us want to know that the audience is is into it. (00:28:49) So on the one hand loosen up a little bit but on the other hand, you know, yeah. Keep quiet. Well, maybe there's a I'll tell you very quick and I think wonderful story on this subject which is something that happened when the wonderful American canister and re-watch was very young and very much at the beginning of his career and he came to the Boston Symphony and he played the Brahms second piano concerto where the first movement ends with tremendous, you know, hubbub and Brilliance and everything else in the audience erupted in this huge Applause and Andrei sat there as though this incredible solecism had been committed out things it's of Set them pretending this hadn't happened. You know that they end Eric lines dorf who was conducting turned to him and said stand up you fool. It was Andre who told me this story better chance. I feel entitled to pass her down sir. Well, maybe we can convince people to be a little more quiet in the in the in the concerts by encouraging them not to sneeze or have conversations during a radio broadcast to Millions more client during the music, but noisier in between. Yes, Michael Steinberg the artistic director of the Minnesota Orchestra Summerfest and Georgia fleas honest the Minnesota orchestra concert Master Our Guest today, two two seven six thousand is the number to call in the Twin Cities eight hundred six, five two nine seven hundred anywhere else and other person is standing by. Hello. What's your question, please? I wanted to thank you for your commitment to contemporary music. First of all second of all, I have a question regarding some reports that have been in the newspapers recently about mr. Dvorak possibly taking up position San Francisco with the Opera Company is that reason for concern from those of us in Minnesota? And I guess the second question to that is how do these conductors managed to Globetrotters so much kind of boggles the mind to think it's so much traveling tool goes on so (00:30:47) well, I have seen the reports about the first your first question about San Francisco and the Opera and having just come from San Francisco and being grabbed by the collar by every everybody there and saying is it really true is he really going to come and take this job and I might answer to that is that I have no idea and I know that I know that there has been negotiations at least to the point of their being Interest by San Francisco 280 and I beyond that I have absolutely no idea what you're going to all have to sit by our radios and newspapers and just watch this develop unless you have anything more to say about it Michael than (00:31:25) that. No, the only thing I would add to it is that one thing I'm completely convinced about is that his commitment to the Minnesota Orchestra and his obligations here is very firm, and we talked with him about that just a couple of days ago. And so I think there's I think there's you know, no no reason for concern they are but other than that, I have nothing to (00:31:46) happen. Yeah. I think it's the whole question about the just World frenzy travel that circuit riding essentially circuit writing is I mean, the profession has accelerated this I think just with I mean if you could fax people, I mean that would be the next thing that will happen and then I don't know I hate to think of the the consequences on that on the artistic soul of performers, but it's I have very close friends who are performers and who have that carry that kind of pace and I guess you know with a really good travel agent and a very good manager who can make this, you know, very careful decisions. And I mean intelligent sorts of recommendations to their artists the kind of life that an artist has today is and performer is really on the brink of I think taking people to their extreme ends and one has to really not be seduced by the incredible possibility for being everywhere all the time and distance (00:32:52) shots of be complex because it does it take a its toll however on the relationship between the artists and the community especially in the case of a you know, a music director. (00:33:02) Yeah. I mean II think that has changed enormously mm. You make my mention something on that (00:33:07) my yeah, I think so. I mean, I think it's very important and it's something that orchestras themselves are Organizations the institution that is always tremendously concerned about with their music directors that they can get enough weeks out of him so that there is a sense of continuity of presence of control, you know, that the you know that the master is in the house and knows what's going on and and the phone and the facts just ultimately not substitutes for that. So it this is I think that can take its toll and musicians are very different. I mean there are there are those who really have a hard time saying no, but you know, I also know some who are incredibly and effectively self-protective and you know who budget a lot of vacation time for themselves or who do things like that if they're changing time zones make a point of arriving at least two days ahead of time so that they're not just stand at the point that they walk out on stage to do a concert and so forth. So a lot of it depends on the individual well, A lot about Regional orchestras in their financial troubles those that have gone under and those that are sort of scaling skating along on the (00:34:20) edges this somehow play into all of that. In other words. It seems to me there must be a business bottom line in (00:34:25) developing, you know, community support for the institution and having that individual (00:34:32) be seen as a person of the (00:34:33) community rather than a great artist who flies in and it is something that I think that's very important. Yeah with the community orchestras. Maybe that's not so much of a problem because those guys don't travel quite in that same way, but I think the sense of identification of the music director with the institution with the community with the city and all of that that that's really important that can be tremendously helpful, but there again, You can't require that of a good conductor. There are conductors who are fabulous conductors who also are just you know by Nature by the kind of puma and temperament that they have a great musical citizens as well. And there are also musicians who you know 99% of the whole psychic and intellectual energy is channeled into their music making and who for all the best will in the world are not terrifically good at the other thing and then in that case the institution has to devise some other ways of filling that space and making up for it. (00:35:39) The only thing I would add to that is that I think that we can't us and underestimate an I certainly am always struck by this when I go away and travel and come back and play in the orchestra is the amount of revitalization that occurs when you go out and play in new environments and new venues and go specifically to play this piece. Or that and or with this person or with this Orchestra and you find that you know, I mean I can I can feel that as when a towel comes back from a from a trip, you know, having been to the Netherlands that he's you know, he there's something something has happened. Something has changed some new thing has maybe been shaken loose and and that certainly is I find that to be the case with a lot of my colleagues to that they gain a certain confidence a new abandoned a new boldness that comes from from that sort very sort of stimulation of travel and encounter. (00:36:33) Let's go back to the phones and encounter another question. Hello. You're on the air. What's your question, (00:36:37) please there was an article in the papers here earlier this year the printed a rather Bleak picture of the future of symphony orchestras in general and they were stating that the demand for Symphonies is waning and the cost is more prohibitive and I'm wondering if either Georgia or Michael would care to comment on (00:36:53) that. (00:36:56) Well, I mean, I think there is no question that you know, certain economic factors are weighing in on all or to Arts organizations. I don't know what time when it hasn't been that way as long as I've been a member of it and I'm not certain how I mean I think as a journalist or past journalist Michael maybe you can make comment on the reoccurrence of these kinds of pieces and I don't want to underestimate the fact that's a lot of it is truthful on the other hand. I think there's no question that we have to constantly as Arts organizations approach the question of our audience and who is our audience. Where are these people coming from? Are we seeing trends of certain generation coming to the end of its concert going life. Do we need to concentrate on education? I think there's one area that every city cannot do enough. Every Arts organization cannot do enough and I'm I feel much more. Buoyed up by what I see going on here with trying to bring music. Let's say into the schools as a means of bringing some security into our future audiences. I don't think we can possibly look at the future without looking at those eight and nine-year-olds in school today who like me, you know, 35 years ago. I had no idea what symphony orchestra was and I was suddenly taken by the hand with the rest of my class and thrown into the fort out of Thorium in Downtown Detroit and scared the hell out of me. I have to say this this creepy building and he's the lights going down and is these people on stage dressed like, you know weirdos? I mean the whole thing was so bizarre that I just I mean I was so captivated that I it was either at that point that I would either decide. This is the place for me to want to come and find out more or you know never again, but as a kid it was it was an indelible experience. I've said this before many times and I can't say it enough times how important it is to just make that investment in The young those young spongy Minds out there who want and should be given that first little, you know, spark of interest in music and and culture period so I know that sort of is a very indirect way of answering the question (00:39:12) 20 minutes. Now before one our guests Michael Steinberg the artistic director of the Summerfest and Georgia fleas honest, Minnesota orchestras concertmaster. Another person is standing by. Hello. Where are you calling from, please Minneapolis and your question. I've got a couple questions. Why don't the musicians look like they're having a lot of fun on stage during a concert and you know, maybe you could Enlighten us a little bit about what's going on in the municipal in the musicians Minds. Well, they're well, they're performing and then how important is the conductor to the orchestra? I think it was the Viennese chamber orchestra that was in town several years ago that came without a conductor and third question is could you comment on the market for contemporary (00:39:52) music? Well, let me try to tackle the first couple Michael you remember the last one? Yeah, I really apologize. I know that I have only on a couple of occasions seen a video of myself playing and and I was pretty amazed at how sober I looked. I mean I thought I was having a great time and and I was having a great time obviously, but there is a there is no question that we don't want to overstretch this but we live on a perilous tightrope as instrumentalists and I and that which means that as much in control as we are of our instruments and experiences any one of us can be there is a point at which at any one given moment in that night of two hours of making music there can be moments when you're not sure what is going to happen. I mean where there's in a good sense that the musical Destiny of the moment has maybe gone a little bit differently than what was planned and you your Self suddenly take on a feeling of getting may be very taken away from the hall from from sitting in your chair that you eat. Something is triggered and you of feeling of just leaving the mall, you know, out-of-body out of mind sort of experience and it's at that moment where you're maybe so into what's happening that that you're really not present. You're not really able to register like one would if I were sitting with a group of friends and just talking and getting sort of all, you know, psychologically entwined in that sense. I mean the relationship the one-to-one relationship of musician to music can be an extremely complex one. And I know that there are moments many moments when you know, we will look around on stage in the middle of a moment which has a particularly I don't know sort of humorous kind of tation to it or where someone is really done something fabulously and you'll you know that and there's got to be some way of recognizing that and yet I think we are very insulated up. I think that our relationship with each other is slightly inhibited by the fact that we're being watched at the same time. We need the audience in order to stimulate us into the performance and to do things that we obviously would not do it to an empty Hall. So the relationship is (00:42:12) sounds like you need to loosen up a little (00:42:13) bit. I I'm getting tense as I talk about this I can feel it because it is it is a particularly personal way of answering of obviously a very important question for the audience and I think we could lighten up probably a lot more than we do and I'll do my best this coming season for you. Just call her. (00:42:31) How about the conductor is all that the importance of the conductor. (00:42:33) Well, this is also a tense making such a question at the same time. It's there's no I would I would love to be able to write a book about how much of a performance is really due to the conductor. And how much of it is due to just the sheer visceral organs. Anak integration of all those incredibly talented people and Stage. I mean, there's no question those of us who have done this for a number of years know the routine. We know the number of ways it can go when the conductor comes and takes away. We've never gone. Sometimes that relationship can be of A Sort where again, I mean he or she or whoever up there is is responsible for something that we cannot do ourselves. So in that sense, they are tremendously important to how the whole thing works at the same time. It's like those moments when you're rowing a boat and you know, you know that you need to or push the or in a certain way to get you going in a certain direction. Then the current comes on and takes you by itself. I mean, the orchestra is a phenomenal current all to itself and there are moments when a conductor can lay back and let it go and there are moments when that person can come in very dramatically and change or affect the the you know, the sort of height the stream the the Voltage of what's going on? So it's it's a role that has tremendous power and tremendous individuality in the effect. But at the same time what is never talked about I guess enough is the extent to which they need us and we are in a sense if we cannot see and visualize what they want then obviously the performance can't take place. So in a very short amount of time meaning the rehearsal period we have to build that relationship with understanding their the boundaries of their imagination the boundaries of their physicality and see to what extent we may be called upon to do our own thing that they may not see your and it's so it's again very complex and it's a wonderful subject Michael no valves often talked about trying to trying to write down some of these things by, you know, not only virtue of our own contact with music, but with things that we've also picked up from you know, other colleagues who've talked about it in our perplexed by this very question so new (00:44:45) music, but before that one question one could also answer or ask is why is it that if you look at the audience they Don't seem to be having a very good time that you know that you're all worried about when they should clap. That's right. Yes, you know, you've been then something absolutely delicious and witty by hiding or something like that Mozart is being played but if you were to take photograph of the audience at that point and then show that to anybody take you know, guess what's Happening Here, they'd say they're listening to a commencement address. So I don't know what kind of dreadful sir. Okay your question about the market for contemporary music. It's lousy. There's no question about that. I mean if we announced a contemporary music series or something like that, we do not have to call extra police for crowd control at the box office and this sort of thing but the distinction I would make and I think is really important is that there is a huge difference between the well the marketing thing the response to what people see in an announcement in the advertisement in a brochure and what their response is when they actually confronted with the music in in concert. Part of the thing here is that contemporary music is such a very compendious term. I mean it means you know thousands of different things many different kinds of styles and sounds many different levels of demand being made and people are people are scared of it and they you know, they tend to be apprehensive if they see anything that's you know, somewhat unfamiliar name in a brochure. I mean, maybe an unfamiliar name belonging to an 18th Century composer, but they see a name that isn't Beethoven or Tchaikovsky or you know, one of two dozen others and they instantly fear the worst. But what happens in actual life in a concert room can be very very different and it depends that depends on the piece. It depends hugely on the Conviction of the performance, you know how persuasive the performance is not just you know, getting everything technically lined up but you know that sort of a real sense of belief in the Vitality of this as musical expression and it depends a lot I think on programming, you know, I'm context and how the piece is set up and how the audience is psychologically prepared by what comes immediately before it. And (00:47:15) one thing I was very encouraged by in moving here was the move on the part of the Walker Center to have the series which we do the symphony does the chamber music series to have it be strictly 20th century programming series and which of course includes incredible numbers of pieces that we all know and love and art, you know would never want to not here in the course of you know of a year and and of course it's what's fascinating is that you realize how now at the end of this century. The I mean there are such old Tunes from the beginning part of the century that you know are no longer considered scare pieces, but it's because those pieces have been played in people know them and it's just a matter of getting it out there and getting getting the opportunities for the for the public to have this relationship with music, which is so close to them in a way. Maybe that's always the that's been the problem internally is that you know, it's us this is us up there. It's not you know, we can't look at it as something that was somebody else's headache and was somebody else's fear piece, you know in 1806. I mean this is this is now safe music and I think that musicians, you know, equally get hung up by this and it's a mistake if anything right now. We are the we are the generation of musicians who really are in a position to best identify with what the composer is going through and that's why in a way working with Curtis on the piece that I'm doing of his and having the opportunity to do a commissioned piece and be at the at the you know headwaters of a piece coming into life. I Sighs how important it was for me to know that I was responsible for peace coming to life and that's that's that's a phenomenal experience for a musician to have for creative artists to have who's not of composure and I'm I'm all for all of you out there who are into listening to new music and and new music meaning 20th century music and I hope that we can just continue to encourage opportunities for to happen. And for the audience has to have that those venues there to go to (00:49:16) your listening to midday on Minnesota Public Radio about 10 minutes left in our conversation with Michael Steinberg and Georgia, please honest and I will try to get to all of the caller's. Hello your next. What's your question, please? Hello there. You're on the air. Yes. I'd like to ask a question about the morale factor in the string sections in Britain and the leadership of the first chairs because rather than how the musicians look and maybe looking more cheerful. I think that many of them have a sense of apathy about what they play and do over the years. It's become more of a problem in recent times, I believe and I'm a string player and I can tell to some degree what's going on in the bow and so on and these players and I've heard for foreign orchestras and last two years and I think that there's a problem there if they could comment on on leadership in the morale in the strings, (00:50:12) please. Well, I'm there's no question having lived in orchestras. Now as as many years as I have and certainly I have many colleagues around me who lived much many more years than I have in that context. I can tell you that it is inevitably a difficulty and I think it's part of the psychological difficulty of having an orchestra where you basically have in the strings five principles who are given the responsibility of making the dictates of you know, how the bows go and how the phrasing goes and working out musical problems that let's say if you were in a string quartet clearly everyone would have equal share in that kind of decision making I would really feel a little presumptuous to make comments about the morale here only because I feel it's I'm still a little relatively new to all of its Dynamics and to some extent I as a person who's a Now in the responsible chair of making decisions, I'm very preoccupied with trying to understand and learn more about the whole process of inclusion. Meaning that you try to listen to people you try to hear comments you try to take into account things that don't work through comments sometimes heard and sometimes heard under the breath about the way things go and rehearsals and decisions that are made and it is a tough very tough role to take and make happen and work happily for everybody. I think in 10 years, maybe I can answer that question a little bit more a little bit more crusty experience under my belt and I think that the system is in a way against being able to give everybody a chance to feel that their voices heard in the decision-making and it and it is a frustration. I certainly one that I experienced sitting not in that chair of as concertmaster and I think time will tell Just how much the morale will improve I feel that in this year of working with the orchestra that with the inevitable gripes and ups and downs of living out a season the Orchestra played fabulously. It's in the last three or four months being together which in a way is where everything sort of accumulates anyway coming to the end of the season and the playing has to reflect something that's that's turning positively and I think we can't possibly live in a gripe this world. I wish it were the case but it's it's not and I think time will tell I think there's a lot of changes that have happened in the orchestra and that is caused a certain amount of unsettledness regaining a sense of stability is going to happen maybe in the next five years. So I think it's a little early for any predictions on or feeling tremendous pessimism about the way things are at the (00:52:57) moment or listener will certainly keep an eye on that. Let's go to the next caller. Hello. What's your question please? (00:53:03) My question is in regard to the percentage of women players in Major orchestras last summer. I heard the Philharmonic plate Salzburg and I was amazed to see that there were no women members except for the harpist and I wondered if this is typical of European orchestras and if it is why well, I don't think it's it's I mean, I haven't seen or set eyes on a lot of orchestras in Europe. I mean, there are a few who are intentionally and belligerently against having women in their Orchestra. I mean the Vienna Philharmonic is one of them the Vienna Philharmonic, right? Yes. It's the Philharmonic. It's so horrible. I can't remember their name, but it's such a detestable thing. But anyway, I mean it certainly isn't the norm. I mean, I know I've seen the Leipzig gewandhaus Orchestra which has which had several women in it London the London orchestras are you know it that's certainly not the case. I'm a little surprised about the check Orchestra, but at the same time not knowing Are their values are in education, whether it's more important for women to go into factories or women to go into science or women to I mean, it's it would be it's being to study just what you know, what is happening in those countries to see whether or not women are in fact encouraged to do other things or just by sheer immuno role modeling that they're that they're often other aspects of professional life. I don't know. I think that it's no longer a big issue for me except in those few orchestras Berlin Philharmonic, obviously where there's another sort of Wall of Resistance and usually those walls are created hideously enough because of the fact that I mean there is some need to think feel that if a woman becomes pregnant that that means that they're not taking their job seriously, and I don't know I mean then how do we get all the men in the orchestra? I don't know. I mean the whole thing is someone's got to give birth to those kids and those people that are you know, eventually maybe the men who are going to go into those orchestras and it seems the whole thing seems very hit Is to me and I still haven't yet become call enough to talk about it in a sensible way. But anyway, I don't know that it's really a problem. It certainly has not become a problem in this country. I mean, there are if you look at most Conservatory orchestras, there are very few men going into music now and it seems that mbas are much more appealing and real estate is more appealing. I don't know where they're going but it's the swing has been dramatic in this country away from from predominantly male. You know preoccupations with this profession. I don't know if you have any other observations Michael on it (00:55:49) now. I just I think just in general just to say that I think Europe is definitely behind us in that respect. I mean, I take this story that you remember of the wife of a very distinguished European guest conductor who came to San Francisco and who asked me what the percentage of women was in the San Francisco Symphony, and I said something Thirty one or two or three percent or something like that and she sort of sighed with relief and said well with us, it isn't that bad yet. Well, I think we've run out of time to take questions from the audience. I wanted to slip in one last one in the Summerfest. Is there any new music that you're that you're playing this year or is it yeah, we're sneaking in some we've in fact, the very first piece is a new piece. That's something I'm very happy to have done. We commissioned a piece and opening Fanfare from John tartaglia Who is the Assistant principal the oldest of the orchestra and who is very able composer and I asked him to write a Fanfare and the Fanfare. In fact is in the calls it fun fatty Beethoven Jana. It uses a very well-known Beethoven theme, so there is a new piece right there. And then we are I asked Leonard slatkin if he would bring back a very powerful very recent piece that he played last year, which is also a Beethoven base the John Curran. Liana's Fantasia on an ostinato, which uses his theme for the Beethoven's 7th. I asked Andrew ran gel marvelous marvelous American pianist to play The Charles. I've conquered Sonata on his program, which is an old old piece but sounds newer than most of what will be written in the next 30 Years and which also quote Beethoven and very surprisingly there is a new wall spy Johann Strauss. That's something went. And Premier Wen doesn't expect every day. But again old friend of mine Jerome Cohen found that in one of the libraries at Harvard University. There was some themes that Strauss had written on one of his American tours, but had never fully developed into a finished piece. And so Jerry took these themes and is very expert very skilled at this kind of thing. No Strauss orchestration styled all of this and so he has so to speak composed of brand-new Strauss Waltz for us and there's some other things too. But those are some of the main things that's something I always admired about lens that gives program that he always managed to get. However the in these it was he always managed to get American Music in there and I wanted to stay with that. It sounds terrific and we look forward to hearing it the Summer Fest begins on Wednesday. And we thank you for coming in today. It's been interesting program. My pleasure. Thank you, Michael Steinberg the artistic director of the Minnesota Orchestra Summerfest and Georgia fleas honest the Minnesota orchestra concert Master today. During listener questions. 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