A Woman in Charge

In honors earned, conductor JoAnn Falletta has the trappings of a noble history. She has won the Stokowski Competition, the Toscanini Conductors’ Award and the Bruno Walter Award from the Juilliard School, where she received her doctorate in 1987.

But as a woman on the podium, Falletta is hardly heir to any tradition. The 34-year-old conductor, who will lead the Long Beach Symphony tonight as an aspirant to the music directorship of the orchestra, was only the second woman to hold a conducting post with a major U.S. orchestra when she was the associate conductor of the Milwaukee Symphony, 1985-88.

Her pioneering career, though, has been little ruffled by blatant sexism or harassment. “In general, in an obvious way, I haven’t experienced that,” she says. “Most of that sort of thing is covert rather than overt.”

Currently, Falletta is music director of the Denver Chamber Orchestra, the Bay Area Women’s Philharmonic and the Queens Philharmonic, the latter an orchestra that she founded 10 years ago as an undergraduate. Acknowledging the problems of transcontinental scheduling, she says she would probably have to give up one of those positions if she became the new music director in Long Beach.

“To be a good music director, you have to know the community well,” Falletta says. “Then you have to figure out how your orchestra is going to be special.”

One of the things that pleases her about the Long Beach Symphony is that “they do have a commitment to challenge their audience.” Saying that “programming is crucial,” Falletta has planned Ibert’s “Escales” and Bartok’s Concerto for Orchestra. Her soloist is pianist Andre-Michel Schub, in Mozart’s Concerto in C, K. 467.

While Falletta is being closely scrutinized, she is observing the orchestra as well, looking for flexibility and a commitment to playing at the highest level possible. “The conductor has to assess if it’s going to be a good relationship,” she says. “The chemistry has to be there.”