Utah Conductor to Appear as Violinist in San Diego

Though Joseph Silverstein, music director of the Utah Symphony, will appear with the San Diego Symphony in three concerts this weekend, he will be leaving his baton in Salt Lake City. Polish guest conductor Grzegorz Nowak will attend to the conducting duties, while violinist Silverstein performs Tchaikovsky’s venerable D Major Violin Concerto.

Silverstein is one of a handful of American musicians who has successfully balanced a dual career of performing and conducting. For 28 years, he fiddled with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, 22 of them as its concertmaster. He maintained his concertmaster responsibilities, but he gradually assumed more conducting duties, moving from Boston’s assistant conductor to its associate conductor. In 1983, he left for Utah, a move that actually boosted his solo career.

“In comparison to the workload of Boston--42 weeks of symphonic and chamber music activity--I now have more time to study scores and practice,” said Silverstein from his Utah Symphony office. The Utah orchestra’s recording contract with Pro Arte also allows him to enjoy the best of both worlds. In recordings of symphonic works by Beethoven, Samuel Barber and Mendelssohn, Silverstein conducts the Utah Symphony, but he appears as soloist in that orchestra’s recordings of the violin concertos by Brahms, Tchaikovsky and the soon-to-be-released concertos of Sibelius and Dvorak.

When a performer enters the conductor’s club in mid-career, however, he is not always welcomed with open arms by those who have pursued conducting as their sole metier.

“I think that conductors who long ago left their activities as instrumentalists look down their nose at us,” Silverstein acknowledged. “Of course, both Andre Previn and James Levine have maintained their piano playing as conductors. And another terribly important factor is that a fine instrumentalist has great credibility with the players when he steps on the podium.”

According to Silverstein, his credibility with Utah Symphony patrons is not too shabby, either.

“We’re selling out most of our concerts. For the 18 weeks of our subscription concerts, our average attendance figure is better than 93% in a hall that seats 2,800.”

It should be noted that such audience loyalty comes along with Silverstein’s liberal doses of 20th-Century music, which has not been limited to the gentle sonorities of Barber but has included John Harbison, Roger Sessions and Leon Kirchner.

“Next year, we are featuring women composers, including Ellen Zwillich, Joan Tower and Lili Boulanger.”

Longtime local residents might be pleased to know that in this rarefied category of composers, Amy Cheney Beach’s Piano Concerto will be played by former San Diego pianist Virginia Eskin.

Adios San Diego. Despite the mild euphoria over Yoav Tamli’s appointment as the San Diego Symphony’s music director designate, not all the news from Symphony Hall is uplifting. Last week, Eric Kim, who joined the orchestra at the beginning of the 1988-89 season as principal cellist, won the Cincinnati Symphony’s principal cello audition and has signed a contract with the respected Ohio orchestra.

When asked what the attractions of the Cincinnati Symphony were, Kim provided a succinct list of unarguable virtues.

“They record, and they tour. They usually play Carnegie Hall yearly, and they have a longer season,” he said.

Kim stressed that he regretted leaving San Diego and characterized his year here as rewarding, both personally and musically. But, although the weather in Cincinnati won’t be as pleasant, he will have the consolation of earning twice as much money.

The 24-year-old cellist’s career is not likely to stop in the Queen City, as Cincinnati is known. In Kim’s first year out of school, he played principal cello with the Denver Symphony. He then moved to San Diego, where his impact on the local orchestra’s cello section over the season has been nothing short of remarkable. His leadership made it one of the symphony’s most cohesive and reliable sections.

“I’m climbing my way up the ladder, which is natural at my age,” Kim added.

At least San Diego has not heard the last of its upwardly mobile principal cellist. With his brother, violinist Benny Kim, Eric Kim will perform Brahms’ Double Concerto with the San Diego Symphony on Nov. 16 and 17.

Chorus call. San Diego Opera may have just completed its 1989 season, but chorus master Martin Wright is already knee deep in next seasons’s musical scores. He will be auditioning singers to join next season’s opera chorus on May 24, 26, and 31 at the Casa del Prado in Balboa Park. According to Wright, Mussorgsky’s “Boris Godunov,” the season-opener, calls for a 100-voice chorus, which is one of the largest choruses the local company has used in a stage production.

Though eager to hear all vocal categories, Wright needs at least 30 new tenors and basses to make his “Boris” chorus capable of rattling the Civic Theatre rafters. Chorus members are paid for their vocal endeavor, although they do not have to belong to the union prior to auditioning. For the audition, singers need to prepare a single selection, although it need not be an operatic aria. Audition times may be scheduled through the opera office (232-7636).

Classical music hard sell. UC San Diego’s music department should win some award for the hard-sell promotion it is giving the May 17 recital of traditional vocal music by Carol Plantamura and Philip Larson. Aiming for the dubious cachet of a motion picture R rating, this program of Verdi, Wolf, Strauss and Offenbach is called “Songs of Temptation and Seduction.”