Copious Notes

Alastair Willis conducts the Lexington Philharmonic in a rehearsal Tuesday night at the Singletary Center for the Arts Concert Hall. Photos by Rich Copley | LexGo.

Click the play button to hear our chat with Alastair Willis:

Copious Notes podcasts are available on iTunes.

Alastair Willis’ résumé reads like a world tour. He started playing piano when he was a boy in Russia, took up trumpet and then conducting while he was living in England, continued his conducting studies in Houston, toured Japan and other foreign lands with Yo-Yo Ma’s Silk Road Ensemble, and held posts with orchestras in Cincinnati and Seattle, where he lives now.

This week, Willis, 37, who speaks with a British accent, has set his sights on Lexington, where he is the ninth candidate to succeed George Zack as music director of the Lexington Philharmonic Orchestra.

“Every conductor needs an orchestra, and every orchestra needs a conductor,” Willis says when asked what attracted him to Lexington. “My research of this area and this orchestra has showed wonderful support for the arts and wonderful potential for future growth here, and I don’t know any conductor who’s currently not got a music director position who wouldn’t be interested in that.”

After one rehearsal, on Monday night, Willis had a good impression of the Phil, saying, “The orchestra seems open to what I have to offer.”

On Tuesday, he threw the players a bit of a curve ball, rehearsing Osvaldo Golijov’s Last Round, the opening number of Friday’s concert. It requires the violins and violas to stand as opposing orchestras, with the basses and cellos seated in the middle. After some initial confusion, he pulled a fairly flowing rehearsal out of the players.

Willis had no hesitation about coming in and shaking things up a bit.

“Why have we always played in the form we always play in?” Willis asks, referring to the Phil’s traditional seating arrangement. “Because it works. Because it’s how orchestras historically sound best, for most of the repertoire. No one’s ever going to change that, but I love to find the variety.”

Willis has experienced a lot of variety in the past few years. He was in Cincinnati in the late 1990s for a year as assistant conductor of the Cincinnati Symphony and Pops Orchestras and director of the Cincinnati Symphony Youth Orchestra.

He says he loved the experience working under symphony conductor Jesús López- Cobos and pops conductor Erich Kunzel, but Cincy didn’t offer what he thought he really needed: “podium time.”

So Willis moved to Seattle, where as assistant and then resident conductor he was able to direct more than 100 performances in three years.

In 2003, he went the free-lance route, guest-conducting around the world and hanging out, when he could, with leading orchestras. He has a particular in with the Berlin Philharmonic, where his sister, Sarah Willis, plays fourth horn.

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Morihiko Nakahara conducts the Lexington Philharmonic in a Tuesday night rehearsal. Photos by Rich Copley | LexGo.

Our conversation with Morihiko Nakahara was so wide-ranging, we did something a little different with this podcast. The audio focuses on his discovery of music as a child and his music education, while the story below is focused on his new job in South Carolina and candidacy in Lexington. Click the play button to heat the podcast.

Copious Notes podcasts are available on iTunes.

If Morihiko Nakahara finds himself in the throes of an inaugural season with the ­Lexington Philharmonic Orchestra later this year, it won’t be an unfamiliar experience.

The eighth candidate to succeed George Zack as music director of the Philharmonic is celebrating an inaugural season in Columbia, S.C., where he is the new music director of the South Carolina Philharmonic.

“It’s been so great to meet a lot of people in the community,” Nakahara, 33, says. “There are more people interested in what we do at the Philharmonic and how we can be a better part of the community. That’s a great starting point.

“Musically, it’s been great. It’s just the start of the journey for us. Things don’t change overnight in terms of ­ensemble ­building and how do we grow as an ­orchestra.” This week, Nakahara has gotten to know the Lexington community as he prepares for Friday night’s concert with the Philharmonic, featuring violinist Daniel Mason and violist Deborah Lander.

Other candidates for the Philharmonic’s top job have other orchestras under their direction. But the size of the Columbia ­orchestra and the freshness of the commitment bring up the question: Is Nakahara still interested in the Lexington job?

“I thought about the possibility of getting the South Carolina gig and how that might impact other searches I was in,” Nakahara says. “With Lexington, I decided not to withdraw. At that point, I had already been to South Carolina and decided they’re comparable groups.

“I thought, that might work to my ­advantage if I did both.”

And he doesn’t just mean he’d be ­drawing two music-director paychecks. Read the rest of this entry »