[Noozhawk’s note: Third in a series sponsored by the Hutton Parker Foundation. Click here for the first article, and click here for the second.]
Santa Barbara’s little orchestra-that-could has become a force that attracts top-tier musicians from around the world. Since its establishment as a community orchestra in 1978, the Santa Barbara Chamber Orchestra has evolved from a hall full of hopefuls to a chamber of achievers.
“We’ve had some interesting names come out of Santa Barbara Chamber Orchestra,” Joe Campanelli, chairman of the SBCO board of directors, told Noozhawk.
“Maestro (Heiichiro) Ohyama’s reach is not just here with the chamber orchestra, but as a teacher, as a musician, with music festivals. He casts a big net in his connection to soloists.”
Santa Barbara Chamber Orchestra musicians have gone on to perform with symphonies in Los Angeles, Boston, New York, St. Louis, St. Paul and Philadelphia. They’ve recorded works around the country and performed on movie soundtracks.
“They’ve come out of this experience with the credentials and qualifications to be taken seriously in other professional venues,” Campanelli said.
Critically acclaimed pianists such as Alessio Bax, Tong-Il Han, Wu Han, Jerome Lowenthal, David Golub, Yefim Bronfman and André-Michel Schub; violinists Cho-Liang Lin, Mark Kaplan and Kyoko Takezawa; and cellists Lynn Harrell, Gary Hoffman and Carter Brey have graced the Lobero Theatre stage as guest soloists with the orchestra.
Former SBCO Concertmaster Nina Bodnar went on to serve as concertmaster at the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra under Leonard Slatkin. Sheryl Staples moved from concertmaster at SBCO to her current position as principal associate concertmaster of the New York Philharmonic.
“I had very big shoes to fill, following Nina Bodnar,” Staples said. “She was quite beloved and a phenomenal violinist. I felt that responsibility, and I learned a tremendous amount during my time with Santa Barbara Chamber Orchestra.”
Staples and Ohyama’s paths first intersected at Crossroads School for Arts & Sciences in Santa Monica where, in the 1980s, he served as instructor, and she was a student.
While Ohyama moved on to Santa Barbara, Staples continued performing solo and chamber works, served as concertmaster with the Debut Orchestra of the Young Musicians Foundation and as concertmaster at USC.
“I knew music was calling me as a career when I was a teen at Crossroads where I discovered my love of ensemble work,” Staples shared. “So being back with Heiichiro at SBCO really was a dream come true for me and an incredible steppingstone for me that helped prepare me for positions I was hired for after that.”
In her role as concertmaster, she discovered the joy of the ensemble world.
“Most violinists hang on to the dream of being a soloist or quartet musician a bit longer,” she explained. “I loved all those things as well, but I recognized my path would be in the ensemble world, especially in a leadership role.
“I was fascinated by the psychology behind it as well as the technical inner workings,” she said. “Ensemble work is very technical, but it’s indescribably inspirational: the communication that happens between a great conductor and a great ensemble.”
Staples went on to become concertmaster for the Pacific Symphony in Orange County, then associate concertmaster with the Cleveland Orchestra before becoming principal associate concertmaster for the New York Philharmonic. Her résumé is replete with engagements across the country.
“Our goals can change as our lives progress,” she said. “When I was 25, during the time I was in Santa Barbara, I would have told you I wanted to be concertmaster.”
But life took turns. She met her husband, New York-based percussionist Barry Centanni, and had two children they raise while carrying on in their musical careers. Besides performing, Staples is on the faculty at The Juilliard School as well as the Manhattan School of Music.
“This is the closest you can have to having your cake and eating it, too,” she said. “It’s a high-profile position with lots of opportunity to lead, play solo, play chamber music and teach while raising a beautiful family with my husband of 16 years. It’s a very full life.”
Today, SBCO Concertmaster Amy Hershberger travels from her home in Pasadena to perform with the Santa Barbara Chamber Orchestra while also serving as associate concertmaster of the Pasadena Symphony, among her many duties as a professional musician.
“It sounds corny, but from the moment I came in the door, 23 years ago, I felt right at home,” she told Noozhawk.
The Chamber Orchestra was rehearsing Mozart’s “The Marriage of Figaro” as Hershberger approached the UC Santa Barbara rehearsal space.
“It was spring,” she said. “The doors were open. The scent of jasmine was coming in. The moment I started playing music with Mr. Ohyama, I felt a really kindred spirit; I felt really in tune with his approach to playing music. It was just like being in heaven.”
She appreciated the seriousness with which Ohyama approached the music.
“But the enjoyment and expression was so apparent to me,” Hershberger said. “I was home.”
With Ohyama, she found precision and an approach to performing that keeps Hershberger and her fellow long-time Chamber Orchestra members doing whatever it takes to return to Santa Barbara, performance after performance.
“It’s a very rare thing for people to be that loyal to a group,” she said. “Any of us who have work, who are successful in our careers, don’t need to spend six hours on the road to perform here, but there’s a bunch of us who have been here for decades because we all have learned a lot from (Ohyama), and at the same time every performance is fresh.
“We have fun. At the same time, we have unusually high standards for playing together. We have great morale, great leadership. We’re a happy orchestra.”
The key, she said, is that Ohyama, too, is an instrumentalist with keen insight into the needs of musicians.
“There are few conductors who come out of the orchestra,” she explained. “That infuses their conducting with a perspective that is very different from other conductors. (Instrumentalists) know what it feels like when they’re allowed to take the ball, play and run. He knows what we need to play well.”
She offers, as an example, recent rehearsals of Beethoven’s “Eroica” symphony.
“He has an ingenuity in reading the score, but he’s also traditional,” she said. “It always makes sense. He shares his vision. It’s not a mystery.
“The notes are not just notes. You take time to express them in a way that fits in the general framework. In ‘Eroica,’ there’s that juxtaposition between feeling of going into battle like it’s going to work out, exultation and fear, between ‘it’s going to work out’ and ‘oh, my God!’ (Ohyama) knows how great it is to go with the performance, to let the players themselves do things and react to them.
“It’s tremendously fun to perform, and we really have a good time. In the world of music, there’s not always that opportunity to do all that.”
The SBCO’s 2016-2017 season continues with a woodwind showcase on March 21 at the Lobero Theatre and a chamber music and dialogue event featuring KUSC host Alan Chapman on April 4 at the University Club of Santa Barbara before Alessio Bax closes out the season May 16 with Robert Schumann’s “Piano Concerto in A Minor” at the Lobero.
Click here for complete concert season information about the Santa Barbara Chamber Orchestra, or call 805.966.2441. Click here to make an online donation.
— Noozhawk contributing writer Jennifer Best can be reached at news@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.