Guest conductor for symphony wants to reach out to audiences

Relevance — to the community, to audience members, to children, to the spirit of the city. That is a major concern of Alastair Willis as he prepares to come to Richmond to audition for the position of the Richmond Symphony music director.

Having appeared with the Chicago Symphony, the New York Philharmonic, and the Seattle Symphony, Willis boasts an impressive résumé; yet, he is modest. Currently making Seattle his base, he travels the world guest conducting.

When Willis was 5, his father’s work as a journalist took the family to Moscow, where their mother pushed all three children to study piano. Willis recounted his early music lessons in a telephone interview. “We went in age order — oldest to youngest.“ As the youngest, Willis went last.

Willis’ older sister would prove to be a huge influence. Willis confesses that “she knows way more than I do about everything because she’s my older sister.“ She became a French horn player in the Berlin Philharmonic and listening to her practice was an education in and of itself, he said.

Willis himself became a trumpet player — his second instrument after the piano — and began singing in his teens. “Dad thought he could sing jazz,“ and Willis’ mother would play hymns on the piano, but “my greatest musical influence was my sister,“ he said.

At Bristol University in England, the curriculum stressed music theory, history and analysis. However, Willis’ “first desire was to be a musician, a performer,“ and though he prefers to think of himself as a practical musician rather than a theoretician, that training proved to be invaluable, he said.

His desire to conduct evolved over time as a result of frustration with other conductors. He began to realize that he could influence a piece a little, but more from the podium. When he began to explore how he could shape a masterwork with his baton, he said he found the experience “exhilarating and life-changing.“ While honing his craft, Willis obtained the equivalent of a bachelor’s degree in music education at Kingston College, which he called a great experience. He taught children up to the age of 15, and offered educational concerts in the London area.

He loved giving those education concerts, he said. “Mom said my school room has since become a concert hall; but rather than teaching 20 to 30 kids, I am faced with thousands.“ He also has done extensive work with youth orchestras and is “always looking out to see what I can do with children,“ he said.

When asked about the biggest challenges facing classical music ensembles, Willis said, it’s the economic climate. “Several small orchestras are dying, are gone; many are in serious trouble.“

One of the greatest challenges for an orchestra is to make itself relevant, he said. “If an orchestra can figure out how to engage the community, that community will support the orchestra when economic times get rough.“

Willis underscored the need to make connections with the community through music. However, “what works in one city might ultimately fail in another.“ Music directors and their ensembles must be flexible and take risks while maintaining those standards that the core audience expects and deserves, Willis said.

Willis plans to program a wide variety of works from all eras and genres, but said he has a particular love of Russian music, probably engendered when his mother used to drag him and his siblings to the Bolshoi Ballet.

Willis stressed the need to reach out to audiences, but viewing it as an education, he prefers to think of it as “opening a door, a window of understanding that they can connect with.“