Geoffrey Robson has been named music director of the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra.
In Thursday’s (6/8) Northwest Arkansas Democrat Gazette, Eric E. Harrison writes, “The Arkansas Symphony Orchestra has ended its four-year national search for a new music director by hiring the ‘favorite son,’ Geoffrey Robson. Robson, 41, who joined the orchestra in the fall of 2008 as associate conductor and a full-time member of the violin section, will be the orchestra’s eighth music director. He has been shepherding the orchestra through its interregnum since the departure of former music director and conductor Philip Mann at the end of the 2018-19 season…. He was the unanimous choice of the orchestra’s search committee, which consisted of members of the orchestra board staff and orchestra musicians. Orchestra CEO Christina Littlejohn explained at the announcement that the orchestra had to first determine if it actually needed and wanted a music director in the traditional sense … ‘And we decided that, yes, we did want an inspiring conductor who could communicate with the musicians and the audience, and one who believes in Arkansas and who believes in our vision.’… [Robson] pledged to continue to connect the orchestra to the community through relevant and innovative programming. ‘The ASO is inseparable from the community it serves,’ he explained. ‘This gives us our purpose, relevance and visibility.’ ”
