The concerts will feature Dmitri Shostakovich’s “Symphony No. 5” composed in 1937— which brought the Russian back into the good graces of Soviet leaders after prior work was deemed ideologically improper — plus works from Felix Mendelssohn’s “A Midsummer Night’s Dream” and Lili Boulanger’s “D’un matin de printemps” (French for “From a spring morning)”.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t
Corbin, in an interview Wednesday, said he was asked in early September to guest conduct the performances because Koch wasn’t going to be available during the scheduled weekend and the situation changed to an audition to replace him a couple of weeks later.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t
“I was thrilled to be guest conductor on this because I’ve actually conducted the symphony twice before in 2015 and 2018 when they had gaps between their music directors,” Corbin said. “And so I was really excited about that. And it’s one of the best pieces that I’ve ever known, which is the Shostakovich symphony, which is one of my favorites in all the world. And so I was really excited to be able to jump in and help out. And then the language changed a couple weeks later and I was asked if I wanted to be considered a candidate, not just a guest conductor, and I of course said ‘yes, absolutely.’”<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t
Koch, named the music director of the symphony in November of 2021<\/a> after a search that started with 50 candidates, said in a phone interview from Metlakatla on Wednesday that he stepped down because of health issues involving himself and his family.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t “I probably will not return to the life of conducting exactly, although I certainly hope that I can do it from time to time,” he said when asked about his future plans. “But in terms of like doing it all the time, like I’ve done for the last 20-something years, probably not. I do hope to stay involved in music in a variety of ways, but basically the future is an unknown a little bit at this point.”<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t Christopher Koch guides the Juneau Symphony through a concert rehearsal at Juneau-Douglas High School: Yadaa.at Kalé on May 30, 2023. He departed as music director of the symphony last month. (Mark Sabbatini \/ Juneau Empire file photo)<\/p><\/div>\n\t\t\t\t The other three finalists and the concerts they will conduct are:<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t • Wilbur Lin<\/a>, music director of the Missouri Symphony as well as associate conductor of the Colorado Symphony. His family moved from New Jersey to Taiwan when he was six years old and he has extensive international conducting and directing experience. He is scheduled to conduct the Juneau Symphony’s winter mainstage concert titled “Virtuosity” on Jan. 25-26, featuring Joaquin Rodrigo’s “Concierto de Aranjuez”, Mozart’s “Overture to the Marriage of Figaro” and Beethoven’s “Symphony No. 7.”<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t • Brad Hogarth<\/a>, associate professor of conducting at San Francisco State University, associate conductor of the Monterey Symphony, and music director and conductor of the Art Haus Collective that brings classical music to the Burning Man festival. He also performs trumpet with a number of orchestras. He is scheduled to conduct the Juneau Symphony’s “There and Back Again” concert on April 4 in Sitka and April 6 in Juneau, which will feature Antonin Dvoraks’s “Symphony No. 9,” Bach’s “Concerto for Oboe d’Amore” and German-American composer Ingrid Stolzel’s “City Beautiful.”<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t • Tigran <\/a>Arakelyan<\/a>, music director of the Northwest Mahler Festival and Port Townsend Symphony Orchestra in Washington state. In 2023 he was honored as one of the “Top 30 Professionals of the Year” by Musical America Worldwide and this year he was named as one of Yamaha Music USA’s “40 under 40 honorees.” He is scheduled to direct the Juneau Symphony’s spring “Homelands” concert on May 31 and June 1, featuring works ranging from Aaron Copland to Juneau singer-songwriter Annie Bartholomew to Louis Ballard’s “Four Moons” — the latter marking the first time the symphony has performed music by an Indigenous composer.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t The finalists were selected from candidates who applied from the previous music director search since as a relatively recent list it still reflects the active and available talent pool for such a position, said Executive Director Charlotte Truitt. She said each candidate was assigned the program they will be conducting when they come to Juneau, and they will meet with board members as well as the symphony’s musicians.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t “We will also be gathering from each of the candidates (their) vision for the ‘25-‘26 season, and part of that will be giving us a description of three classic concerts and one pops concert,” she said.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t A candidate tries his hand at “Defiance”<\/strong><\/p>\n\t\t\t\t Corbin, a resident of Newberg, Oregon, is a professor of instrumental music at George Fox University in that town, a conductor of Chehalem Symphony and the George Fox Wind Ensemble, has served as music director of the Tilikum Chamber Orchestra, and led concerts with Beaverton Symphony and the University of Portland Symphony.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t He’s also got ties to the Juneau Symphony dating back to 2009 when he came roughly once a year to perform in concerts. In addition to conducting the symphony twice previously, he and his wife, Caryn, have alternated the principal percussion and principal timpani seats between them for the past two years.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t In the “Brilliant Defiance” concerts Corbin is being asked to showcase a symphony by Shostakovich composed after he’d been formally denounced by Stalin — and thus denounced by the state press — and been told by the Soviet Union’s cultural chairman to “reject formalist errors and in his art attain something that could be understood by the broad masses.” The resulting “Symphony No. 5” for a time quelled the suspicion Shostakovich was a dissent — an appeasement Corbin said is fitting for the title of this weekend’s concerts.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t “What I understand from that is really looking at the Shostakovich as a model of he gave the Soviet government what he needed to to be back in the good graces of them, and not either kicked out of the country or sent to Siberia — a good thing,” he said. “But he did it in a way that had a lot of subtext and subtlety, and was kind of defiant under the most obvious scheme of things.”<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t![\"Christopher](\"https:\/\/www.juneauempire.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/10\/37494903_web1_SymphonyDirector-JUE-241002-as_1.jpg\")
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