In Sunday’s (9/18) New York Times, Phillip Lutz writes, “When Itzhak Perlman resigned as the Westchester Philharmonic’s artistic director halfway through last season, leaving the orchestra without a designated artistic leader for the first time in its 28 years, few thought that, on the eve of a new season, it would neither have a new leader nor actively be seeking one. But that is the case. The orchestra’s administration has warmed to the leaderless approach. Not so at the Westchester Jazz Orchestra, the county’s other signature ensemble, where the quietly persuasive artistic director, Mike Holober, having impressed the orchestra’s administration with his ability to shape the sound of the 16 strong-willed players under his baton, is settling in for an extended run. Despite their contrasting leadership models, both ensembles are enjoying more than a modicum of success.” Perlman’s resignation early this year sent the Philharmonic “scrambling to replace the April and May subscription concerts and to come up with programs for the 2011-12 season. … But the replacement concerts excited audiences—the conductor Jaime Laredo closed the season with a rousing rendition of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony at the Performing Arts Center at Purchase—and the outline for the new season that emerged in the wake of that success revealed an impressive if hastily assembled series of programs, each with a different conductor. At the podium will be conductors with qualities suited to the works at hand,” including Raymond Leppard, Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, Georg Manahan, and Tomomi Nishimoto.
Posted September 19, 2011
