Young symphony players bring lots of energy

By JOHN FLEMING

© St. Petersburg Times, published June 22, 2000

SARASOTA -- Up to 500 young symphony players arrived this week for the biennial National Youth Orchestra Festival. They're members of youth orchestras from northern Virginia, Atlanta, Dallas, Milwaukee and Minnesota, who will play in a series of concerts from Friday through Tuesday at the Sarasota Opera House.

A top-level youth orchestra can sound as good as a professional one, according to festival artistic adviser Donald Thulean.

"They play all the major repertoire," said Thulean, who retired last year as vice president of the American Symphony Orchestra League. "I would think that most of these orchestras have done a Mahler symphony within the last two or three years. They've got a lot of energy and a lot of enthusiasm. The artistic leadership for many of these orchestras is superb. They rehearse longer than a professional orchestra would."

Each of the five youth orchestras will play its own program in concerts Friday and Saturday nights. The musicians also will be deployed among four newly formed orchestras to rehearse during the festival and then play in concerts Tuesday.

In one highlight, Benjamin Zander, music director of the New England Conservatory Youth Philharmonic and the Boston Philharmonic, will lead a festival orchestra in Shostakovich's Symphony No. 5 Tuesday night.

Other conductors on the festival faculty are Apo Hsu, artistic director of the Women's Philharmonic; Larry Rachleff, professor of conducting at Rice University; and Christopher Wilkins, music director of the San Antonio Symphony. The instrumental faculty includes principal players from major symphony orchestras.

The festival, presented by the ASOL and Florida West Cost Symphony, had one problem to overcome. The opera house, which is too small for a symphony orchestra, was pressed into service because the renovation of Van Wezel Hall has taken longer than planned. Van Wezel is scheduled to reopen in October.

"They're extending the opera house stage so that it will accommodate the orchestras, but it is too bad Van Wezel isn't ready," said Thulean, adding that the festival is tentatively set to return to Sarasota in 2002.

More than 170 youth symphonies are affiliated with the orchestra League. They play a key role in communities where public schools have cut back on music training.

In Pinellas County, for example, instruction on stringed instruments was virtually eliminated from the curriculum in recent years. That hurts the Pinellas Youth Symphony, where string sections have become somewhat underpopulated.

"I'm afraid that has become more typical in the last decade," Thulean said. "What many youth symphonies have done is work in tandem with the schools to start youngsters in string programs. Of course, it takes time. String players don't develop overnight. It takes cooperation between the public schools and the youth orchestras."

National Youth Orchestra Festival events include concerts Friday and Saturday at 7:30 p.m. and Tuesday at 3 and 7:30 p.m. at Sarasota Opera House. Tickets are $10. For tickets, information: (941) 953-3434; www.fwcs.org/nyof.