0:04

You can expect a musical soundtrack as

0:06

East Texas prepares for the total eclipse

0:08

that will cross Texas on April 8th

0:10

. That soundtrack will be provided by

0:12

the East Texas Symphony Orchestra , and

0:15

UT Tyler Radio connects with music director

0:17

Richard Lee . Have you ever directed a musical

0:19

event that was related to a celestial event

0:22

before ?

0:24

The short answer is no , definitely

0:27

not . It's a unique thing . It's a unique

0:29

idea . Happy , we're doing it , but

0:32

it was a little bit tricky to program

0:35

. It's such a specific kind of event

0:37

thematically that it really doesn't work .

0:41

Now the performances are on April 6th

0:43

and the Saturday before the actual eclipse

0:45

. Tell us about them and the

0:47

music that you chose .

0:49

I know it's going to be spectacular . The folks I've

0:51

spoken to have really talked

0:54

up how special , mystical

0:56

even the event that is the

0:58

event on the Saturday on the 6th . We're

1:01

calling it a totality . It's a very brief program

1:04

that's thematically based on , well

1:07

, the Eclipse music , if you can find it , but otherwise

1:10

sort of just vaguely celestial music

1:12

, both classical and sort of cinematic

1:14

soundtracks will last about an hour

1:17

. I think it'll be a lot of fun .

1:19

Well now , the performances of John Williams

1:21

, for instance , is an easy choice . Yes

1:24

, it was , but tell me about choosing Strauss

1:26

and Holst .

1:28

The first thing I did was this

1:30

sounds so prosaic , but I went to Google

1:32

and I typed in classical

1:35

music , eclipse , and see who popped

1:37

up . And the first thing

1:39

that popped up was a piece called Totality

1:41

. That was written the last time

1:43

the eclipse came through this country , not so long ago

1:45

. So apparently the composer witnessed

1:47

it , was so moved and inspired he wrote a piece

1:50

based on sort of the actual event

1:52

of the eclipse , sort of starting

1:54

, progressing , you know , arriving

1:56

at full totality and then receding and

1:58

becoming normal daylight again . And it's

2:00

a short little four-minute piece

2:02

that depicts this event so literally

2:04

that we decide to make

2:06

that sort of the center point of the program

2:08

. So video totality . And then we surrounded with

2:11

music the things that came up

2:13

Total Eclipse of the Heart . Did I look for

2:15

an arrangement for an orchestra

2:17

of Total Eclipse of the Heart ? Yes , there is one

2:19

, but it's out of print . I can't get it anywhere

2:21

.

2:22

Oh gosh .

2:26

And you know , I thought of here Comes the Sun by the Beatles . I tried to look for anything

2:29

and everything . It

2:31

was varying degrees of success

2:33

, I can tell you that . So we end up with the

2:36

Strauss is very simple , it's

2:38

the fanfare from . Most

2:41

people know it from 2001, . A Space Odyssey

2:43

, that minute . And there's the monolith

2:45

and , yeah

2:47

, the Holst . Of course he

2:49

wrote a piece called the Planet , so it's really more

2:52

from an astrological standpoint , but it references all

2:54

of the known planets of the time . So there's

2:56

a piece about Mars which we're doing , there's a piece about

2:59

Jupiter and there are other pieces about Neptune and

3:01

Saturn , all that sort of thing . So we're playing excerpts

3:03

from that too . I think

3:05

it's going to be a really broad-ranging

3:07

program . It's designed to be family-friendly , it's designed

3:09

not to be too long either , which

3:11

is important , I think .

3:13

As if the music were not exciting enough , TJC's

3:16

Earth and Space Science Center is going

3:18

to supply visuals for the audience .

3:21

What's that going to be like ? Well , you know , I've

3:23

seen all the visuals . The one for

3:25

Totality is very specific to the

3:27

eclipse . The other ones

3:29

will be more of a slideshow

3:31

, I think . So , for example , guess what he's going to show

3:34

. When we're playing Mars , there'll be a lot

3:36

of images of said planet , right , and it's sort of

3:38

the very literal . What we

3:40

did decide , though , is , when we're playing that , we are

3:42

playing the Star Wars theme . Why

3:48

not ? Right ? I mean , it's based in a galaxy far , far away , so it's it's certainly space themed . We

3:50

are not going to be showing lightsaber duels

3:52

, and no . Darth Vader It'll be more generic

3:55

stuff . But yes

3:57

, there will be sort of a because

3:59

again I think I said this already we

4:01

expect families to show up to Tyler

4:03

looking for things to do that weekend . You know

4:05

that don't know anything about the city , about

4:08

what's on offer , so we wanted to make sure

4:10

this was really available to a broad cross-section

4:13

of folk . And

4:15

you know that was part of the

4:17

idea to make it even have young children

4:19

in tow , that you could bring this concert for an hour , then

4:23

go to the planetarium . I mean , it was just such a great

4:25

partnership to be able to

4:27

partner

4:29

with the Space and Science Center

4:31

over at TJC , because they provide so much

4:33

of the technical aspect

4:36

of this event .

4:37

Some are predicting that Tyler's population will double

4:39

that weekend before the total eclipse . Of

4:42

course , as you said , you have an opportunity to reach

4:44

a wide variety of people . Two performances

4:46

with seating for just over 700 . Are you going

4:48

to sell it out ?

4:50

That's the goal . I hope so

4:52

. I think it would be very unlikely

4:55

that there would be a lot of tickets left at the door , if

4:58

any . So if this is something that interests

5:00

you , unfortunately you all need to sort of pre-plan

5:02

and sort of buy tickets online , which you can do at etsoorg

5:04

. I can look right

5:06

now . We have a 4 o'clock and a 7.30 show

5:09

on the 6th of April . Yeah

5:13

, it's . I don't know if you've been there , mike . It's a beautiful

5:15

hall but it's a small hall and when

5:17

they fixed it up a couple years ago they weren't able

5:19

to increase the footprint any

5:22

that was really set

5:24

in stone . So

5:28

increase the footprint any that was really set in stone . So the capacity

5:30

didn't change that much . So

5:34

it's a little bit small . In terms of the capacity of people , the stage is perfectly big enough for

5:36

the symphony but , yeah , the crowds

5:38

, the audience part of

5:40

it , is still a little bit undersized

5:42

for a typical symphony orchestra .

5:43

No , no , no , not undersized , it's intimate

5:46

.

5:47

It is very intimate though You're right , but it's

5:50

funny . When I'm on the stage there versus

5:52

Cowan , you can really clearly

5:55

get a sense of the difference in volume between the two spaces

5:57

, between UT Tyler and TJC .

6:00

You know , it strikes me that any musical director of

6:02

any symphony orchestra , of any size

6:04

, is constantly challenged to

6:06

find ways to engage the current supporters

6:08

and to start cultivating the future

6:11

supporters .

6:13

Yes , because often they don't have

6:15

the same priorities or tastes

6:17

or vision in

6:19

terms of what we ought to be playing . But

6:24

folks have been pretty open-minded

6:28

here and they've certainly understood that

6:30

I need to be provided broad leeway

6:32

to program the way that'll continue

6:35

to grow . I

6:37

mean , grow is even a strong word , you know survive

6:39

. You know orchestras most orchestras are in survival

6:41

mode . This is not a great

6:44

post-COVID . Covid

6:46

was awful for symphony orchestras . There's still

6:48

a whole bunch of orchestras in this country that are still

6:50

feeling the lingering after effects

6:53

of that . You know they lost a year and

6:55

a half of their income , their revenue

6:57

. Musicians did too , and

6:59

a lot of folks haven't recovered to

7:01

the level in terms of audience participation

7:04

that they had pre-COVID . I mean

7:06

, they haven't gotten back to the swing of

7:08

things . It's always

7:10

difficult . It's more difficult now . The swing

7:12

of things , it's always difficult , it's more difficult now . But I think the board , the public

7:15

in general , at least in my face , have been very

7:17

, very , very , very nice about what

7:19

I've been trying to do , which is really , you

7:21

know , the easy tagline is music for everyone . There's

7:23

going to be familiar music , there's going to be

7:25

challenging music , there's going to be new music , there's going to be old music

7:28

, music people know Music

7:36

, old music Music people know them . Music people don't know . I think you've just got to throw everything out there and people have got to trust

7:38

in the day that I'm not going to put terrible music on the stage . You know that I'm deciding

7:40

what's good and what isn't , and that's essentially my job when it comes

7:42

to programming .

7:44

I'm looking forward to hearing Total Eclipse of the Heart

7:46

. I can't

7:48

wait for that .

7:50

I wish I'd found the arrangement , but we

7:52

are doing Star Trek . I don't know if you're a Trekker or a

7:54

Trekkie or whatever you want to call them , but we're

7:56

doing a medley of Star Trek themes , which I

7:58

was when I was growing

8:01

up , I mean in middle school

8:03

and high school I watched a lot of Star Trek . So

8:05

to be able to play through some of those 80s and 90s

8:07

sort of TV soundtracks , tv

8:10

themes , I'm looking forward to it .

8:12

I get that Absolutely . Just

8:14

recently , you worked with UT Tyler Music professor

8:16

, dr Kyle Gullings , to present Gridiron

8:19

, a

8:22

musical tribute to Friday Night Football in East Texas . Now , as I understand it , this

8:24

was your idea , and quite a project .

8:25

It was my idea and people thought it was crazy

8:27

. You know , classical

8:30

music and football isn't something

8:32

that is twinned often , but

8:36

when I got here , well

8:38

, let me tell you when they did . When they got here . You probably haven't figured

8:40

this out . I'm not from here , although I

8:42

sound more and more East Texan each passing year

8:44

. You do y'all , I know

8:46

right . I started to say y'all only about two years

8:48

ago . I kind of resisted , for so long

8:50

and I said okay , well , I live here now . You've

8:53

got to fit in , I've got to be the way I'm supposed

8:55

to be here in East Texas . So

9:01

the first thing I said was what makes this place ? You know , because I need to know the program

9:04

, I need to know what pieces in Toronto or in Winnipeg . You know where

9:06

I'm from . You kind

9:08

of know , broadly speaking , what the tastes

9:10

of the audiences are here . I had no

9:12

idea . You know , I was hired . I'd never

9:14

lived here . So one of my first

9:16

projects was to really sort of figure

9:18

out the region and

9:25

I drove around , spent time in Marshall and Jefferson and all these

9:27

other places and , of course , in Tyler

9:29

. One

9:31

of the things that immediately struck me was how sports-crazy people were . That in

9:33

itself is not unusual in this country . There are all

9:35

sorts of sports fanatics , nuts

9:37

fans in the United States , let's say

9:39

that . But what I found very odd

9:41

was , you know , I'd turn on the television

9:44

, I'd listen to the local sportscast . Instead

9:46

of talking about the local , you know , the professional

9:48

baseball team or whatever , they'd be talking about

9:50

high school football . I mean , the entire

9:52

segment was on and it was obviously filmed

9:54

on someone's iPhone from

9:56

the stands . And I said this

9:59

is different , what is going on here

10:01

? And it became apparent to me especially

10:04

when I met Julie , my wife , julie Philly

10:06

, who works at UT Tyler . I have

10:09

two brothers-in-law now who

10:12

are football coaches . I've never

10:14

had football coaches in my family before

10:16

. So

10:18

you had hockey players and I had to start going to

10:20

football games , which I'd never done . So

10:22

it's like , okay , high school football

10:25

is a thing here , like

10:27

a real thing . And then I did some more

10:29

research . So

10:34

if I said we have to , my job is to make the orchestra relevant

10:36

. You know , are we going to continue to play Beethoven

10:38

? Yes , but he's not ours . At the end of the day

10:40

, he's , he doesn't belong to this culture

10:42

. It's great music and we're going to keep playing

10:44

them , but part of the

10:46

mandate of the symphony is to figure out how to

10:48

represent who we are now . And

10:51

I said , well , who we are now here , gosh

10:54

, I mean , part of it's got to do with high school football

10:56

and how do we celebrate that musically . And that's

10:58

when I approached Kyle . I said , kyle , I have this crazy

11:00

idea . Would you be interested in writing

11:02

a piece about it ?

11:03

Actually , kyle said that when you talked to him on the phone you

11:06

said don't hang up , it's

11:08

a crazy idea .

11:11

It's a good idea , I mean , and the results

11:13

speak for themselves . He did such a great job . The

11:15

piece was so well received . But

11:18

I think folks initially were

11:20

very confused by the idea , didn't

11:23

quite understand what

11:25

it was going to be all about . But I think the

11:27

end result was great and it did indeed

11:29

celebrate who we are . I think

11:32

people , when they come to the

11:34

symphony , need to know that this

11:36

is something that I hope when

11:38

my tenure is over , whenever that may be that

11:41

they understand that part of my mission is to make

11:43

sure the orchestra feels like they belong

11:45

to the folks in the hall . It's not my orchestra . I'm

11:49

only going to be alive for a short time , you know

11:51

. Hopefully this orchestra will be around

11:53

for generations to come and the whole

11:55

idea is the ETSOs got to belong to East

11:57

Texas , got to belong to the people out there who are

11:59

listening and they have to feel some

12:01

sort of stake in what we do . And I think

12:03

that was part of my mission doing Gridiron

12:06

Symphony , saying , hey , I wouldn't do this

12:08

if I were in Toronto . Of

12:11

course I wouldn't do this . If I were directing the orchestra

12:13

in Winnipeg , where I was before coming here , of course I wouldn't

12:16

do this . But this is because

12:18

we are here , because this is the orchestra . This

12:20

represents to some degree

12:23

who we are and what makes us special

12:25

, and I think it made a

12:27

lot of people pretty pleased to

12:29

see that and it's always fun to have

12:31

high school band kids play with us . That

12:33

was fabulous , it was a great time .

12:35

My question to Kyle was okay , you're going

12:38

to perform it once , but surely you're

12:40

going to perform it again . I mean

12:42

, we have nothing else this fall .

12:45

I hope so . I mean , let me just

12:47

say this the classical music

12:49

industry is not built like the

12:52

pop music industry . Pop music industry

12:55

is built on replaying

12:57

a song over and over again , kind

12:59

of ad nauseum , for several months , you

13:01

know , and then it recedes . I

13:03

think classical music , you think the long game , I

13:06

think it will be redone , but it's

13:08

a lot harder to have

13:10

folks redo works

13:12

, and In

13:15

other places it's just . I think if

13:17

you're an established composer maybe that happens . But

13:20

you know , the joke is it's you know , when you premiere

13:22

a piece it's almost always one and done . It

13:24

really really is , and you've got to be happy

13:26

with your single performance , because

13:28

the likelihood of it being picked up by

13:31

other orchestras around across the country

13:33

is pretty minimal . This piece is so

13:35

special , though I think there's a far better chance

13:37

that that would happen .

13:38

It was the first thing I said to Kyle . I said I'm

13:40

thinking Dallas Symphony , the Houston

13:42

Symphony , the Austin , san Antonio

13:44

. I mean this is a Texas thing .

13:46

It is , it is and

13:48

it is . It is portable . I

13:51

mean I think you could have a lot of success . What

13:54

folks don't realize is that Kyle post-composition

13:58

was a huge part of this right , because

14:00

it took a lot of coordination

14:03

just just getting the band kids on

14:05

stage with us playing , you know . So all

14:07

that stuff was extremely stressful

14:10

and Kyle took the lead role in that too

14:12

from a logistical standpoint . So

14:15

it's great music , but it took a lot

14:17

of of of lot of work

14:19

behind the scenes to make sure it actually was

14:22

successful . It was when we did it , but

14:24

yes , I hope so it deserves to be

14:27

. It's a really beautiful

14:29

piece of music . There

14:31

are a lot of people

14:33

in my family , I mean we play all sorts of great things

14:35

. We play more John Williams and we played

14:38

all sorts of great stuff in the program , but my sister-in-law

14:40

, one of them , said that her favorite thing was Kyle's

14:42

Beast . It was the slow movement from Kyle's

14:45

Beast , which is something because he was up against

14:47

some heavy hitters in

14:49

the compositional world , so to speak . So yeah

14:51

, he did great .

14:53

You mentioned your wife , Julie Philly . She

14:55

is number two at

14:58

the University of Texas at Tyler and

15:00

now named a finalist

15:02

to replace Dr Kirk Calhoun

15:04

when he retires in May . You have strong roots

15:07

here in East Texas . Looks like you'll be here for the foreseeable

15:09

future . What kinds of projects do

15:11

you have in mind for the future ?

15:13

You know it depends on what time frame

15:15

you want me to talk about . I think the foreseeable

15:18

future is our program for

15:20

next year's set . It's been released to start

15:22

to get people excited about that , but

15:25

also , yes , to plan for the future . To

15:27

figure out I

15:30

think you alluded to this before . I think there's always

15:32

a balancing act for me is to figure out how to

15:34

balance what people

15:36

want with what people don't want , how

15:39

to balance the old and new . How to balance the

15:41

vision of the subscribers who've been here , been

15:44

coming , for 40 years versus the person who's just coming

15:46

for the first time . How to balance folks who

15:48

are , you know , 85 and love class music

15:50

versus a young family who've never

15:53

been to symphony before . This is

15:55

a really hard job and I

15:57

don't think I'm perfect at it yet , but I'm

15:59

definitely getting better . But

16:01

it's something that I need to be really constantly

16:04

honing my ability to

16:06

sort of figure out where that balance is . But

16:09

yes , I would think that you

16:12

know I would anticipate more

16:14

. Maybe integration is the right word

16:16

. What my , what Julie , my wife , is really

16:18

good at is figuring out how to use use

16:21

B and use the symphony in ways that

16:24

will deepen the connections between

16:26

UT Tyler and the ETSO , and that's

16:28

not a dumb thing . Of course she wants that . I want

16:30

that too . This is our home

16:32

. When we play , we normally play at the

16:34

council , which is a great venue , much

16:37

better , Certainly with the addition of the Shell

16:39

that we did several years back . So

16:42

I know she has some projects

16:44

in mind . We were doing something

16:47

pretty soon that she's calling

16:49

medicine and music .

16:51

Oh , yes , yes , and that's what the woman's doing that

16:54

is really really big and it's

16:56

very successful . Yes , hospitals

16:58

and medical facilities across the country .

17:00

There's no question that music is a

17:03

contributor to health in some way

17:05

, shape or form , and

17:07

to explore that avenue is very , very important

17:09

to me as well . I don't

17:11

think I would be as sane as I am

17:14

I hope I'm sane If it were not for

17:16

music listening to , performing

17:18

, studying . It's a huge part of who

17:20

I am , and it should be a big part of everyone's

17:22

lives as far as I'm concerned .

17:25

Thanks for listening as UT Tyler Radio connects

17:27

with Richard Lee , Musical Director

17:29

of the East Texas Symphony Orchestra . For

17:31

UT Tyler Radio News , I'm Mike Landis

17:33

.