SPO's fellowship program nurtures talented young conductors

8 conductors vie for podium in Seoul

By Park Jin-hai

In celebration of its 80th anniversary, the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra (SPO) organized the "Conducting Fellowship," a special program to train the next generation of conductors. A total of 59 people applied for this program, from which eight trainees were selected.

Those selected have the opportunity to receive direct instruction in conducting from the SPO's music director Jaap van Zweden. After three days of open rehearsals, which continued through Thursday, the top three finalists who received the most votes from orchestra members — Song Min-gyu, winner of Italy's Guido Cantelli International Conducting Award; Harris Han, assistant conductor at the Pierre Monteux Festival and Park Keun-tae, principal conductor of the Berlin Neue Philharmonic Orchestra — were chosen to conduct during the "Conducting Fellowship Concert," to be held at Lotte Concert Hall on Friday.

The music director emphasized that conductors can learn a lot from experience, especially by being in front of and working with an orchestra.

“One of my biggest goals is that these young conductors can taste and have the experience of being with an orchestra. Because being with the orchestra and working with them is a completely different experience than preparing it in a room when you are alone or just with a pianist who can play the orchestra part,” he said during a press conference at SPO headquarters in central Seoul, Wednesday.

He stressed that his legacy will be defined not only by his past concerts but also by the future of the diverse young conductors he's helped to cultivate.

“We (senior conductors) need to give back to the new generation and tell them everything what we know. We are just ambassadors for the composers who are here already for ages and it makes me proud to see that young conductors are growing very fast in a few days," he said.

Regarding this open competition format, van Zweden noted that conductors should learn in a public environment rather than the usual closed-door master classes.

"Conductors will never be behind closed doors. They will always be in the open around the public and the public will judge them. That's how it is in normal life. The press and the orchestra members will judge them. Therefore, I think it is better to run a public program like this than more closed master classes," he said.

"I try to teach them a few things but they learn the most from each other, because when somebody is doing not really great that is what you write down. So, this combination of being together with the press, with an audience later on and with the orchestra members can be a very hard and tough lesson but it is the best lesson."

The finalists include Song, Han and Park as well as Choi Jae-hyuck, former fellow conductor at Switzerland's Verbier Festival Orchestra; Kim Ri-ra, former assistant conductor of the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra; Kim Jun-young, second Kapellmeister at Germany's Theater und Orchester Heidelberg; Kim Hyo-eun, guest conductor at Germany's Oper Frankfurt and Juya Shin, fellow conductor at the London Philharmonic Orchestra.

Park, active in Berlin, said, "The maestro gave us time to rehearse, and the orchestra continued to work with us until the sound I wanted, the music I wanted, came out 100 percent without giving up. In fact, this is something that is difficult to do in such a highly professional orchestra, but the music director gave us the opportunity to delve into it until the end, which was really impressive. Through this, he showed us a lot about how to approach the meaning that the composer intended for the orchestra."

Han, from the U.S., said it has been a tremendous opportunity to work with van Zweden.

"He is a very detailed conductor and he makes us all demand more from ourselves that we can give," he said.

Choi gave high marks to this rare conducting fellowship program, saying, "'There are not many programs like this in the whole world. It's such a great opportunity to learn from a top-notch orchestra without an attendance fee."

The final winner, who will earn the privilege of serving as SPO's assistant conductor, will be decided after Friday's concert. However, the orchestra has not yet determined how many candidates, if any, will be selected for the position.