Category: Conducting Electricity

Cat Links Conducting Electricity

A postcard from Europe

Posted on Courtney Lewis

I’m writing from Amsterdam, the third stop on the New York Philharmonic’s EUROPE/SPRING 2015 tour. So far we’ve visited Dublin and completed a residency at the Barbican in London. This week we’re playing in one of Europe’s most highly esteemed and acoustically perfect venues, Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw, a 2000-seat shoebox-shaped hall with a warm and generous sound that might remind you of somewhere closer to home… The London residency began with the Philharmonic’s music director, Alan Gilbert, addressing the Royal Philharmonic Society. His incisive speech outlined a vision of what an orchestra can and should be in the 21st century. Faithful readers will note many parallels with my own ambitions for the Jacksonville Symphony, especially concerning our role in the community, the meaningful presentation of new music and the need

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Cat Links Conducting Electricity, Jacksonville Symphony

The constant quest for the unattainable, or Being a Professional Musician

Posted on Courtney Lewis

Over the last few months I’ve been delighted to discover great interest in what goes on behind the scenes at the symphony, especially in regards to the auditions I described last month. That has made me think about the bigger picture: what exactly leads some of us to become professional musicians, and what’s it like living the dream? It starts in childhood. I have friends who remember the first time they held a violin and immediately felt a tactile connection with the instrument and its sound, and others who can’t remember a time when they didn’t sit in front of the piano every day. My earliest memories are before I played an instrument – of music itself – which is perhaps why I chose to

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