THE END OF A GLORIOUS ERA
Bramwell Tovey is preparing to conduct his final concerts as VSO music director.
A series of events loom extra large on concert dockets over the next few weeks — the final performances of conductor Bramwell Tovey as music director of the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra.
There is the première of Tovey ’s Shalimar Variations for Piano and Orchestra at the Bramwell Tovey conducts J. Strauss and Tchaikovsky concert, followed by a grand opera-in-concert rendition of Britten’s Peter Grimes, and the final regular concert of Tovey’s tenure, Mahler’s Second Symphony at the Resurrection: The Season Finale concert.
This is not the end of Tovey’s VSO connection.
The orchestra’s longest-serving music director (now in his 18th season) will assume the role of conductor emeritus, and continue to delight and challenge audiences for years to come.
But it is the end of an era, and a glorious one. Tovey has changed the VSO in many ways, and we need to review and celebrate his achievement.
All stakeholders will have their own lists of spectacular evenings in the Orpheum with the maestro.
Mine include the opera-in-concert performance of Bernstein’s Candide in 2015, Britten’s War Requiem in 2014; and the complete Mahler symphony cycle, especially an incomparable Fourth at the Chan in 2012.
When I asked Tovey about his great Vancouver moments, I was mildly surprised by his choices.
The first dates from 1998, when Tovey came to Vancouver.
“I conducted Bruckner’s huge Eighth Symphony as a last-minute replacement. Those concerts were among the most memorable of my career, and led directly (after several other visits) to me being offered the music directorship of the VSO, beginning in September 2000. It has been a run of 18 remarkable years.”
Tovey’s next chosen moment is bittersweet.
“A few years into my tenure, the son of one of our musicians was killed in a road accident. The entire orchestra attended the funeral. I was deeply moved by the way his colleagues rallied round as a community.
“This greatly affected how I have thought about orchestras ever since. People who play together day in, day out, dealing with the language of music, express the human experience very intensely through extraordinary works of art.
“The musician who lost his son is still a highly valued member of our orchestra. I withhold his name out of respect, but the experience changed my own thinking completely.”
Another defining Tovey moment came in the fall of 2011 when, after eight years of planning, the VSO School of Music opened.
“Our daughters Jessica and Emmeline were among the first students enrolled. In partnership with Jeff Alexander (now president of the Chicago Symphony) and Art Willms ( VSO’s board chairman for over a decade), we brought off the impossible and fulfilled the crazy scheme I brought to Jeff and Art back in 2003 — that we should open a music school to shore up the VSO’s resources, at that time newly recovered from a financial crisis.”
While most VSO fans are thinking about the great moments of past seasons, Tovey is looking to the future and his new gig with the BBC Concert Orchestra.
But past, present and future are always interconnected. Tovey made his first recording with the BBC Concert Orchestra in 2010.
“This led to my accepting the post of principal conductor in 2018. But back in the hotel in North London, as I walked into the bar, I heard the VSO playing O Canada on the television as Canada beat USA in men’s hockey. We had recorded 120-plus anthems for the ( Vancouver Winter) Olympic Games, and this magical moment I shall never forget.”
A final highlight is how Tovey was able to show his VSO to the world.
“In 2008-09 the VSO visited the Beijing Festival and toured Korea, with Hilary Hahn as guest soloist playing the Tchaikovsky violin concerto. Later that same season we toured Eastern Canada and performed in Ottawa, Toronto, Montreal and Quebec with pianist Avan Yu.
“In 2012 we toured the eastern United States with Jon Kimura Parker, and in 2017, finally, we toured British Columbia. My final season was topped off by an eastern Canadian tour ... that included Winnipeg, my old stomping ground.” What will be Tovey’s legacy? Aside from the memories of wonderful concerts, the VSO he leaves is far stronger in several important ways, starting with a smooth and effective transition.
Tovey, administration, players and board have handled a great deal of change and renewal with unusual success. When music director designate Otto Tausk gives the downbeat in September, his era will begin with strong organizational support.
Tovey has made music education a priority, the capstone being the VSO School of Music, very much a Tovey project, and a fairly audacious one. The recent appointment of Angela Elster as vice-president promises much.
A fine composer, Tovey established new music as a priority with the annex concerts and the New Music Festival. Main series concerts have featured major works, like Jennifer Higdon’s Percussion Concerto in fall 2017.
Audiences have now come to expect and welcome new works.
Tovey ’s programming has shown a deep, sincere commitment to cultural diversity. He has repeatedly addressed ideas that matter, and has found quality music by gifted composers (himself included) that consider important issues.
Finally, Tovey defined the VSO music director’s relationship with the community. He has been so ubiquitous, so engaged, and so visible it scarcely seems necessary to point out how active he’s been.
This is often not the case, made worse in recent years by the jetset lives of many conductors.
Tovey made it clear the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra belongs to all Lower Mainland residents and that we should cherish this cultural resource. He has our heartfelt thanks and gratitude.
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