I
am so happy that, as a member of the Symphony League, you have chosen to
join the WVSO family and share in a season of great symphonic music. I
hope you will find our programs entertaining of course, but I also hope
you will get much, much more from the music we play.
Here’s some good news: it does not take any special training to
appreciate the deeper levels of meaning and significance in symphonic
music. While intense practice and study is certainly required to
compose and perform music, the appreciation of music takes only a
willingness to allow the music to speak to you. Ultimately, it is you,
and you alone, who can make sense of a given piece of music and it is
your own personal and human experiences, (and not your musical training,
whatever that may be), that you will use to make sense of your listening
experience.
If
you were to compare your impressions of a given concert with a friend
who just heard exactly the same performance, you would indubitably find
much that would match more or less exactly. But I would also predict
that there would be many points of divergence in your views. And I
wouldn’t call these disagreements, since they are, by definition,
personal reactions. These opinions are, naturally, formed by your
life’s experiences; your cultural and ethnic background; your own joys
and your sorrows.
I
hope you will read this as an invitation to host your friends at the
symphony. Perhaps there are people whom you know who claim not to find
symphonic music to their taste. I like these kinds of people, since I
usually discover that they have never really listened to symphonic music
and, most important of all, have not experienced the special intimacy
and rewards of a live concert.
Please help us by inviting your friends and neighbors to a WVSO concert,
and then spend time talking about your experience – what the music and
its performance meant to you and your friend.
You
will hear music on our season by many justifiably famous composers, but
we have also chosen to present music that will range from comparatively
to completely unknown to you. This is done on purpose, not as an
experiment, since I believe all the music we are playing is of the
highest quality and worthy of your time and attention. The season as a
whole is a smorgasbord offering from the millions of possibilities that
exist.
I
hope you will take this journey with us in the spirit of embracing all
the music on our season - whether the pieces be old friends or,
hopefully, potential new friends, I trust it is a journey we will enjoy
taking together. I am certainly looking forward to it!
For
all you do to help keep the music playing, I say “Thank You!” Your
service as a member of the League is of enormous significance to the
orchestra and we all feel so grateful for your support and attendance.
