Conductor Louis Langrée.
In Wednesday’s (5/1) CityBeat (Cincinnati), Anne Arenstein writes, “As the New York Times noted last July, Louis Langrée concludes ‘a quietly transformative era’ as the maestro ends his 11-season tenure as the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra’s music director with two sets of concerts in May…. I interviewed Langrée throughout his CSO career and it’s been a rare privilege to gain a sense of him as a musician and a generous human being deeply committed to his art, the CSO and the Cincinnati community…. Langrée: Music is sharing in three senses. Music is a dialogue: one performs, listens and responds. That was my job last night (at rehearsals for the Brahms Requiem), especially for the musicians who have no words but respond to singers. In last night’s rehearsal, when the baritone sings a phrase, the trumpets echo him. Even if they don’t pronounce the words, we understand. And without that sharing, music is only notes on a page…. If you want to be a genuine music director of a city’s orchestra, you have to live in that city … You can’t check the local and social media. Only if you deeply understand yourself and the city’s problems can the symphony be part of the solutions.”
