Read / A Season of Energy, A Season for Everyone
Conductor on conductor interview
After a summer break, we sat down with Music Director Nicholas Hersh and Principal Pops Conductor Ryan Murray as they chatted about our upcoming season.
Ryan Murray, Principal Pops Conductor (RM): Nick, I’m really excited for your Classics Series! I think every Classics concert this year has something for everyone—something that makes this music accessible. It’s a little bit away from the “overture-concerto-symphony” format, and although that may be scary to some people who are comfortable with that model, there are still giant symphonic pieces in there. Can you talk about how this season is going to appeal to the long-time classical music lovers, but also those that are thinking about coming to the concert hall for the first time?
Nicholas Hersh, Music Director (NH): Thanks for that! The thought behind our Classics Series was to provide a unique experience at every concert. You could come to all of them and have a completely different experience each time. Our first concert is probably the most traditional, but the concerto element of it is probably the LEAST traditional bit of it. It’s featuring a saxophone first of all, which is a very rare instrument for concertos, and featuring one of the absolute best in the world at it, Branford Marsalis. He’ll be playing two very jazz-inspired pieces by Milhaud and Williams, and that’s paired with the amazing ever-green Symphonic Dances of Rachmaninoff, which again, sort of takes that idea of what a symphony can be and takes it a step further.
“The thought behind our Classics Series was to provide a unique experience at every concert. You could come to all of them and have a completely different experience each time.”
And then we come to our second concert where the traditional format is tossed out the window! We’re doing this ‘mixtape’ idea, which in this case, is featuring the Four Seasons. We’ll be playing some of Vivaldi’s “Seasons”—but only one as a matter of fact. Each “Season” is written by a different composer, and each of them has their own voice. Some of the Seasons are inspired by Vivaldi, such as Max Ritcher’s ‘Autumn’, and it’s an exciting way to experience how music evolves.
We pair that “quartet of seasons” with a couple of other pieces that emphasize seasonality: Mendelssohn’s A Midsummer’s Night Dream and “La Calaca” by Gabriela Oritz, which I’m very excited about. La Calaca is about Day of the Dead, which is the very weekend that we’ll be having that concert.
Then we come to your feature performance on the Classics Series, Fantasia in Concert, maybe you could talk a little about that, Ryan?
RM: I’m really excited about that, I just conducted it in May 2024 [with the Auburn Symphony], and it’s just an unbelievable show. It’s the greatest moments of classical music with the brilliance of Disney animation. There’s Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony, Firebird—it’s exciting music, but it’s an incredibly difficult show for the orchestra and the conductor. I’m looking forward to taking on that challenge again—it’s just a magical, magical thing.
It's going to be great fun to share with our audience in Modesto, in the beautiful Gallo Center, and it’s always nice when you can do a show a second or third or fourth or fifth time, because you find different things in it as a conductor. It’s like you’re starting from level two instead of level one or zero.
A question I get a lot about Fantasia from patrons is: “Is it the original or is it the new one?” It’s actually a mix of pieces from both the original Fantasia and Fantasia 2000 that Disney in Concerts has put together for us.
The Sorcerer's Apprentice, Dance of the Hours, The Nutcracker Suite, and Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony are from the 1940s version, as well as Clair de Lune, which didn't even make it into the original cut of the film, but was recorded and is also in this concert. Then we have Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, Firebird, Pines of Rome, and a few other pieces from Fantasia 2000.
NH: The greatest hits, isn't it?
RM: Yeah, absolutely!
NH: Of course, we finish our Classics Series with two concerts, one featuring the talents of our Modesto Symphony Youth Orchestra joining us on stage for a performance of Copland's Rodeo. As well as Carnival of the Animals, which is all about discovery and youth.
We’re finishing off the Series with Verdi's Requiem, which is as epic as it gets. It’s one of the great masterpieces of anything written for orchestra. It features our MSO Chorus in an unbelievably intrinsic way, even more so than Beethoven's Ninth Symphony last year. They’ll have to sing the entire way through, and I’m very much looking forward to working with our fabulous chorus and our chorus director, Daniel Afonso on that. And meanwhile… we have a great Pop Series coming on as well!
RM: We do! The Pops Series this year, in a way, is kind of like a season of second chances because we have some great things that we just slightly missed out on in the past.
Nikki Renée Daniels was going to sing Holiday Pops! with us two years ago but was unable to join us. Now, she's coming back this year, and I'm really excited! Her voice is just unbelievable, and she's been singing everywhere since then—with major orchestras and major Broadway shows and companies.
Then when we head into spring, and Capathia Jenkins will return for her Aretha Franklin tribute show. I was so sad that the audience didn't get the chance to hear her at Picnic at the Pops in 2023 because of the unbelievable torrential rainstorm and lightning. But I can tell you just from the dress rehearsal—she is one of the finest artists I have ever worked with.
Capathia brings this amazing musicianship and subtlety and such incredible colors to her singing, and although it works outdoors—it's going to be even more exciting indoors, where people will be able to intimately hear all the amazing things that she's doing with her voice. It's a fantastic show, it's brilliant music, and I can't wait for Capathia to come back.
We’re finishing off the season with another film, and although we've made our way through the original Star Wars trilogy—we're sticking with John Williams. We're doing Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark! What a fun summer adventure movie with the incredible music of John Williams. It's just going to be another smash hit!
NH: Oh, yeah, that's one I haven't had the pleasure to conduct yet! Is this your first time as well?
RM: Yeah, I haven't done it before, either. It’ll be fun to dig into it. The great thing about John Williams is that every time you open a new score, it’s like visiting an old friend. There are new things, but there is this language he has that is so natural for the orchestra.
"The great thing about John Williams is that every time you open a new score, it’s like visiting an old friend. There are new things, but there is this language he has that is so natural for the orchestra.
NH: That's what it is, isn't it? It's one of those amazing things with him where when you start rehearsing it, you look at it on paper and it seems very virtuosic, and very, very difficult. But then, it just fits, it just works.
RM: It just clicks, yeah.
NH: You don't have to futz with anything, every dynamic, every timbre is just *so*. It’s challenging and yet fluid at the same time. I can think of very few other composers like him who have that kind of flexibility.
RM: The rhythms are exciting, the melodies are beautiful, and the orchestration—it works brilliantly.
So, it's a great Pops Series with lots of different kinds of music for different audiences.
And of course, our Holiday Candlelight Concert. This is such a special concert in the unbelievable St. Stanislaus Catholic Church. It’s an amazing chance to showcase the traditional music of the holidays, and the incredible ability of our MSO Chorus.
I think it's so fitting and so perfect that Daniel Afonso conducts this concert. He does a beautiful job with it, and it’s a real chance for our audience to get to know him better as the incredible musician that he is, and to meet our chorus on a more intimate level. And paired with the Opus Handbell Ensemble, it's just such a fun and festive event and I always enjoy when I can be there as an audience member too.
NH: I think that ties in beautifully with the concept of the Classics Series. Each of these performances is its own experience. They bring a different kind of energy, and we’ve called this season, the “season of energy.”
Audiences will get to see something new and rewarding from each concert. It's been great fun putting this together with you, Ryan, and our wonderful staff of the MSO.
A Season of energy!
