Up Front with Jeffrey Kahane: Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra Music Director

Equally at home at the keyboard or on the podium, Jeffrey Kahane has established an international reputation as a truly versatile artist, recognized by audiences around the world for his mastery of a diverse repertoire ranging from Bach, Mozart, and Beethoven to Gershwin, Golijov, and John Adams.
Since making his Carnegie Hall debut in 1983, Kahane has given recitals in many of the nation’s major music centers including New York, Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, Los Angeles, and Atlanta.
He appears as soloist with major orchestras such as the New York and Los Angeles philharmonics, Cleveland and Philadelphia orchestras, and the San Francisco Symphony, and is also a popular figure at all of the major U.S. summer festivals.
Kahane made his conducting debut at the Oregon Bach Festival in 1988.
Since then, he has guest conducted many of the major US orchestras such as the New York and Los Angeles philharmonics; Philadelphia Orchestra; Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra; and the Chicago, Detroit, St. Louis, Baltimore, Dallas and New World symphonies among others.
Currently in his 18th season as music director of the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, Kahane concluded his tenure as music director of the Colorado Symphony in June 2010 and for 10 seasons was music director of the Santa Rosa Symphony, where he is now Conductor Laureate.
He has received much recognition for his innovative programming and commitment to education and community involvement with all three orchestras and received ASCAP Awards for Adventurous Programming for his work in both Los Angeles and Denver.
The 2014-2015 season is your 18th as music director and LACO’s 46th. Can you share what you love so much about this orchestra?
This orchestra is very important to me, not only because of what it is in the present, but its role in my own musical development. I grew up here in Los Angeles and I actually attended some of the very first concerts this orchestra played when they began their first concerts at the late 1960s under Sir Neville Marriner. I knew the orchestra as an audience member growing up, and then later early in my career I played with the orchestra as a piano soloist but even then, this would have been in the 1980s, I had no idea that would one day I would possibly be the music director. It’s a remarkable bunch of people. I think it’s a very unusual institution artistically in that there’s a tremendous feeling of family and affection and so many of the orchestra members have been with the orchestra in some cases as far back as the 70s. And a lot of us have sort of grown up together in a certain way, musically, artistically, personally.
You will retire after your 20th season with the orchestra. Can you share a little bit about that decision?
It was a decision that I thought about for a long time. Obviously, when one is a music director, one has to realize that things cannot go on forever. It’s not good for the institution. It’s not good personally for a person to keep doing the same thing over and over again. It was difficult, but I knew several years ago that it was the right thing to do for me and for the musicians. And the wonderful thing is that I am going out on an immensely positive note in many ways. Not only is my relationship with the orchestra musically and personally very positive, but the orchestra’s in really good shape. That’s not an easy thing in this day and age to say. So many orchestras around the country, especially in the last several years, have struggled just to survive, and we’re doing really well, which is a great achievement in and of itself.
Why do you think it’s been so successful?
First and foremost, it’s because they’re just a remarkable bunch of musicians. The level of playing is so high. The intensity that they bring to the music making, the spirit they bring, it’s something very different. Los Angeles is very blessed in having an orchestra like the Los Angeles Philharmonic, which is, of course, another one of the world’s great orchestras, but it’s a completely different animal, so to speak. It’s an orchestra of 100 players and we are an orchestra of 40. A chamber orchestra, by definition, is more intimate and more personal. I think our audiences feel that. They feel the direct connection with the individuals in the orchestra.
Can you talk about how the orchestra has evolved?
When I took over the orchestra, which, as you said was 18 years ago, like many orchestras, the L.A. Chamber Orchestra had gone through a very rough patch in the 1980s and early 90s. Economically, orchestras were often struggling. In fact, LACO, like a lot of orchestras, came at a kind of near-death experience. So when I took over, I was faced with a certain amount of demoralization, both among the members of the orchestra and the Board and the audience. There was a feeling of “Where are we going?” It was a little bit of a sense of being adrift and not being sure what the direction was. And because of the combined spirit of the staff, board and musicians and myself, we were able to achieve some really extraordinary things over the last 18 years, including taking the orchestra to Carnegie Hall, taking the orchestra on a European tour…these were things that when I first started with the orchestra 18 years ago, no one would have believed possible. And it’s been a wonderful journey in that sense, to see an organization that was in somewhat of a fragile condition become one that is very healthy and very vibrant and with a very loyal and devoted following.
With the 2014-15 season now under way, can you share some of the highlights that are ahead?
We are going back to our former home, the Ambassador Auditorium in Pasadena, one of the most beautiful concert halls in America, for a special concert we call our Discover Concert, where I explore a piece of music. We devote an entire evening to a single piece. This year, we’ll be doing the Mozart Requiem, which I’ll be talking about for the audience with live examples by the orchestra on stage. Then we do a complete performance and we’ll be joined by the great L.A. Master Chorale. That’s just one of the highlights of the season.
For those who aren’t too familiar with the orchestra, can you share a little bit about where the current homes are?
We are an interesting orchestra in that we have multiple homes. We have two main homes. One is the Alex Theater in Glendale, where we play on Saturday nights and then at Royce Hall at UCLA, where we play on Sunday evenings at 7 pm. We also have a baroque series downtown at the beautiful Zipper Hall at the Colburn School of Music, which is just diagonally across from Disney Hall. We also have a series in Santa Monica at the New Roads School called Westside Connections, curated by our concertmaster Margaret Batjer, which is a very unusual series where we do kind of interdisciplinary programs. We have people from other disciplines from the world’s literature or architecture or dance, what have you, interact with us. And then we play once a year, at Ambassador, so I guess you can say we have five halls.
What would you say makes a good music director or conductor?
Well, that’s a difficult question to answer because there isn’t really one thing that makes a good music director. I think it depends so much on the kind of orchestra and the place in which the orchestra is. In the case of the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, because it’s such an intimate group, it’s a group with very high standards, but also very personable and very much, as I said earlier, a feeling of family. And I like to think one of the reasons my tenure has worked well for the orchestra because I bring a sense of personal relationship and caring. I’m very respectful of my colleagues. I care about them very much and they know that. I’m also very demanding in terms of the standards and the level of music making. I think a music director has to be incredibly intense in everything that he or she does. I think a good music director has to be a people-person in this day and age. You have to be able to interact well with people. You have to be able to talk in front of a camera, and you have to be willing to do that the things that musicians aren’t necessarily trained to do, like go out and raise money which is a very important part of a music director this day and age.
When your tenure does come to an end in three years, do you have plans of what you’ll be up to?
First of all, I am happy to say I will continue my relationship with the orchestra. I will only be here once a season, but it’s wonderful to know that relationship will continue. The Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, although it’s the most important part of what I do, it’s not the only part of what I do. I am here probably eight or nine weeks out of the year, and the rest of the year, I tour and perform as a guest conductor or a piano soloist or very often both. So I’m traveling all over the country. I don’t anticipate that will change. I don’t have any plans at the moment to seek another position as a music director. I’ve been a music director of three orchestras over 20 years now. In a way, I am looking forward to seeing what life is like without having that responsibility, because it is an enormous amount of responsibility. It’s a tremendous amount of work. It’s very gratifying but it’s also stressful, and it’ll be nice to see what it feels like. So, I don’t have any specific plans to keep doing what I’m doing, which is making music.
Finally, for anyone who wants any more information, where can they go to find out about tickets or show times?
Well, the website, we have a fantastic newly redesigned website, which is www.laco.org. And they can also call our box office, which is 213-622-7001, and it will prompt you for exactly what to do if you want to buy tickets, or get more information. But the website is great, and it’s a wonderful way to see all the different things that the orchestra does.