Training next generation of musicians key for UBC conductor
To judge from what’s become the new normal, 2018 should be quite the year for conductor Jonathan Girard and the UBC Symphony Orchestra. Girard, who has a doctorate from Rochester’s famed Eastman School of Music, came to UBC on July 1, 2012. Since then he has been building on the heritage of the UBCSO, but in his own affable way, stretching the ensemble and redefining it.
Actually, it’s all going according to plan. “One of the things I did when I applied for this job was to show them a plan of what the job should be over four years — balancing educating students with entertaining an audience as well,” Girard explained when I spoke with him in Boston over the holidays.
A university orchestra has other unique advantages. “We are lucky because we are not dependent on ticket sales, so we can do Canadian premieres of little-known works and conceptualize them with other pieces that we discuss during the rehearsal period.”
Girard has programmed works as grand as Mahler’s “Resurrection” Symphony; given the Canadian premieres of works by Mitteleuropean operetta composer Emmerich Kalman; and, just last fall, offered the first Canadian performance of Les Animaux modeles, Francis Poulenc’s wartime ballet based on the fables of La Fontaine.
The idea is to create interconnections for the students. “They get a sense of the larger continuum of symphonic repertoires while concentrating on works that teach them specific lessons. Every student gets a chance to play their instrument in a work that is representative of the style and repertoire they would be playing as a professional musician.”
Besides serving players in training, Girard believes that the university orchestra must serve the needs of the School of Music, the university as a whole, and the wider community.
“Celebrating the UBC community is very important to me,” he says, outlining an upcoming collaboration with the UBC Wind Ensemble. “We are going to do an all-Wagner concert, MOMENTous, based on the Ring, requiring massive forces, so I am going to invite alumni to come back as performers.”
MOMENTous, Feb. 9, will feature bass John Hines and provide a showcase for UBC’s new clarinet expert, Jose Franch-Ballester, in David Maslanka’s Concerto for Clarinet and Wind Ensemble. A month later the orchestra will accompany the winner of the UBC Concerto Competition, and tackle Carl Nielsen’s astonishing Fourth Symphony (“The Inextinguishable”) on March 9. Both concerts will be at the Chan Centre.
As well, the UBCSO will release a pair of CDs in the coming year, and there has been outreach concerts in venues like the Spinal Chord Centre, and the Centennial Theatre on the North Shore.
Forging links beyond the university gates is also important for Girard. “I’ve been involved with the VSO’s Orchestral Institute at Whistler, and it is going to expand, with a chamber orchestra and concerto opportunities for students, and also training student conductors.” This year, following their week in the mountains, students will be able to add a further week on campus with the inaugural University of British Columbia Chamber Orchestra Festival, July 3-8.
Training the next generation of conductors is a priority, and Girard sees it as yet another chance to use the resources at his disposal.