Couple’s Efforts Earn Financial Commitments : Valley Symphony to Perform Again

A young Sunland couple, leading an attempt to revive the San Fernando Valley Symphony after a lapse of a year and a half, announced last week that they have received funding commitments for up to four concerts in 1986.

The first concert, they said, will be held Jan. 25 in the Reseda High School auditorium, the hall used by the orchestra when it folded in 1984 under a rising debt.

The San Fernando Valley Symphony performed classical concerts for 37 consecutive years until its directors said that they could not raise the money to complete the 1984 season. The directors cited the effects of Proposition 13, the 1978 tax-cutting measure, and the lack of private donations.

Debts Worries Have Abated

Lois Johnson, the orchestra’s new music director and conductor, and her husband, William Johnson, the new president of the symphony’s board of directors, said that some of the debt has since been repaid, some has been forgiven and the remainder will be paid off later.

Lois Johnson, 27, is a violinist with several Southern California symphony orchestras and has conducted several minor orchestras and ensembles over the past 10 years. William Johnson, 31, is a Los Angeles lawyer who specializes in representing Japanese businesses.

The Johnsons said that the first concert, expected to cost $18,000 to $25,000, will be partially underwritten by a $10,000 grant from Chevron USA and by the donations of individuals and foundations.

In addition, William Johnson said, a Japanese businessman, whose name he declined to disclose, has guaranteed to pay expenses not met by other donors. He said that the businessman is willing to make the same commitment for up to three more concerts if the orchestra’s revival is well received.

The Johnsons said that they and the symphony’s core supporters hope to build the once-semiprofessional orchestra into a top-flight organization and to begin broadcasting its concerts on the radio.

‘The Highest Quality’

“Our goals are to really have the highest quality we can have,” Lois Johnson said.

In the first concert, which she will conduct, a small orchestra of about 40 pieces will perform popular classics. The program will consist of a Handel concerto grosso, Copland’s “Appalachian Spring,” Ravel’s “Mother Goose Suite” and Beethoven’s Second Symphony, she said.

Late last week, the Johnsons also announced a major addition to the program--an innovative visual display described as photographic choreography by its creator, James Westwater.

During “Appalachian Spring,” Westwater will project hundreds of his color photographs of Appalachia onto three screens.

Reached at his home in Columbus, Ohio, Westwater said the slide show, called “Appalachian Suite,” “is an attempt to blend the creative, expressive power of the visual with the creative, expressive power of serious music.”

Westwater said that it portrays American culture and values that are still preserved in the Appalachian region.

Slides Reflect Pioneer Heritage

“The visual content of ‘Appalachian Suite’ is composed of a trio of themes that reflect important aspects of this diverse region--the rugged natural beauty, remnants of the pioneer heritage and the portrayal of life on a contemporary family farm,” Westwater said.

Westwater premiered the work with the Cleveland Orchestra in 1983. He said he has performed it and similar works on Alaska and the American wilderness with the symphony orchestras of Cincinnati, Rochester, Seattle, Houston, Philadelphia, Long Beach and Honolulu, but never in Los Angeles.

Westwater said he is eager to bring the work to Los Angeles, which he described as “one of the most visually oriented cities in the nation.”

Lois Johnson said Westwater’s performance will represent a fun and innovative approach to classical music that she and other board members hope will lift the Valley’s oldest and largest symphony out of its troubles.

In a letter that the Johnsons said is being mailed to 6,000 of the symphony’s past patrons, the new board outlined ambitious plans for the orchestra. In the past, such musical figures as composers Henry Mancini and Elmer Bernstein, both highly respected for their movie scores, have been on the symphony’s podium.

“The symphony is embarking on a program that will make it a national force in the symphonic music field,” the letter says. “The symphony’s activities for the coming year and beyond include four subscription concerts, semimonthly radio broadcasts and an endowment campaign.”

For the subscription concerts, the group proposed a program of well-known pieces such as Brahms’ Fourth Symphony, Stravinsky’s “Petrouchka” and Richard Strauss’ “Til Eulenspiegel.”

Series of Recording Sessions

The letter also says the board has created a radio division called “The Los Angeles Radio Symphony Orchestra” and that it intends to begin a series of recording sessions in January at the Forest Lawn Hall of Liberty for broadcast by radio stations throughout the country.

The letter says that the concerts will consist of symphonic music interspersed with short inspirational messages, and that contributors to the symphony would be invited to attend them.

Finally, in the letter, the board asks for contributions of $10 to $10,000--and up.

“We’re getting enough back so we can make expenses” for the mailing, William Johnson said of the letter appealing for funds.

However, the primary impetus for the symphony’s revival now appears to rest with the personal determination of the Johnsons.

They moved to Los Angeles from Tokyo three years ago when William Johnson, a former Mormon missionary in Japan and a Brigham Young University graduate who studied Japanese, accepted a position with the law firm of Finley, Kumble, Wagner, Heine, Underberg, Manley & Casey to represent Japanese businessmen here.

Several Orchestras

In Los Angeles, Lois Johnson picked up work with most of the region’s orchestras, including the Peninsula Chamber Orchestra, the Newport Chamber Orchestra, the Long Beach Symphony Orchestra and the Pasadena Chamber Orchestra.

Having studied conducting at the Manhattan School of Music and the Pierre Monteaux School of Conducting in Hancock, Me., however, she wanted a chance to conduct.

“I’ve conducted since I was in high school,” she said. “The thing about conducting is it’s very hard finding a job.”

The Johnsons became involved in the San Fernando Valley Symphony in the spring of 1984, just as it was collapsing under increasing financial pressure.

“It was a slow squeeze,” then-President Inge Ameer said. “The support just shriveled up.”

The symphony’s support from the city and county declined dramatically from a high of more than $30,000 before the passage of Proposition 13 in 1978, Ameer said. Also, regular donations made by Local 47 of the American Federation of Musicians were discontinued.

The symphony began borrowing in 1980 and its debt rose to nearly $50,000 in 1984, Ameer said.

By then, the symphony had resorted to holding weekly bingo games as a last-ditch device to raise money. But they didn’t raise enough.

Concerts Canceled

That March, the 19-member board canceled most of the remaining season of concerts. No concerts were held this year.

This summer, the Johnsons and several other past board members, as well as some new recruits, regrouped.

The Johnsons said they decided to put the orchestra on a more professional footing by hiring a higher percentage of professional musicians for concerts and dropping the symphony’s past practice of not charging admission.

Tickets for this year’s concerts will be priced at $8 to $15, he said.

In its resurgence, the board has yet to firmly establish the symphony’s artistic direction.

The Johnsons said some members favor a move toward more popular music to attract a wider and younger audience, but others insist on maintaining a strong classical foundation, they said.

“We’re going to try to do really fun things, not just music for the very esoteric in the field,” she said.