Online Season Finale With Yakima, Interview Series, and a New Book –
Conductor Lawrence Golan Keeps the Music Alive from Home
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| For the first time in his career, conductor Lawrence Golan will host a season finale virtually. As has happened across the country due to COVID-19, the Yakima Symphony Orchestra, like many of its colleagues, has had to be creative when it comes to planned events. On May 30th, the exact date of the original live season finale concert, Maestro Golan will instead host a live, interactive, virtual online event from his home in the form of a free zoom meeting for up to 500 people.”Conversation and a Concert with Lawrence Golan” will feature a taped performance of the orchestra’s 2017 performance of Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 4, preceded by a talk about the work and answers to questions from the event participants.
“During this most unique time, I think it is extremely important for us to continue to connect with our musical communities–whether that be our audience members, board members, musicians, chorus members, students or colleagues,” says Golan. “The world needs music and community connection now more than ever. By continuing to connect, it helps people to realize that no one is alone and we are all in this together.” Yakima Symphony Orchestra For more details about the event visit www.ysomusic.org. “Conversation and a Concert with Lawrence Golan” follows the orchestra’s interview series “Stories From Home”, an extension of the current season’s storytelling theme that Golan has curated with Yakima musicians and conductors since April 25. Each weekly “episode” discusses highlights and memories of each musician’s tenure with the orchestra, what they are most looking forward to this coming season, silver linings of the current situation and interesting, unique facts about each artist followed by a brief performance by the musician. Like many of his colleagues, Maestro Golan is also taking advantage of the “performance pause” to prepare scores for next season, and has quietly released a book for conductors on score study entitled “Score Study Passes: A professional conductor’s guide to preparing a musical score for performance.” A detailed description of the score study process Golan uses, it is an effective tool not only for studying scores but also for the teaching of conducting, and may be used for preparing to conduct musical scores of any type, from Baroque to Contemporary, Classical to Pops and Orchestral to Opera. It is available online on Amazon.com. |
About Lawrence Golan
Acclaimed for his vibrant, inspired performances, imaginative programming and evocative command of different styles and composers, American conductor Lawrence Golan has developed a reputation as a dynamic, charismatic communicator. He has conducted throughout the United States and in Bulgaria, Canada, China, Czech Republic, El Salvador, England, Georgia, Germany, Italy, Mexico, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Russia, South Korea, Spain, Taiwan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan, and continues to develop relationships with orchestras nationally and abroad.
Golan has served as Music Director of the Yakima Symphony Orchestra in Washington state since 2010, Colorado’s Denver Philharmonic since 2013, and Pennsylvania’s York Symphony Orchestra since 2014. He is also Music Director of Colorado’s Lamont Symphony Orchestra and Opera Theatre at the University of Denver.
In addition to concerts with the orchestras of which he is Music Director, Lawrence Golan is in demand as a guest conductor. Recent guesting includes engagements at Spain’s Collegium Musicum La Rioja in Logroño; Bulgaria’s Varna Summer International Music Festival; conducting the final round of the 14th UNISA International Piano Competition in Pretoria, South Africa; leading the American Festival Orchestra on a tour of China and the Tucson Symphony Orchestra in performances of A Southwest Nutcracker with Tucson Regional Ballet Company (his eleventh consecutive return). The planned world premiere (for string orchestra) of Pau Casals’ String Quartet in E minor for the Reus Concert Association was canceled due to COVID-19. Among the organizations he has guest conducted are Germany’s Bayerische Philharmonie, Italy’s Orchestra Sinfonica Città di Grosseto and Orchestra Sinfonica di Sanremo, Mexico’s Orquesta de Cámara de Bellas Artes, China’s Wuhan Philharmonic, the Batumi Music Festival in Georgia, Eastern Europe, the Portland Ballet Company, the Maui Pops Orchestra, and the Colorado Music Festival.
A staunch advocate for music education, Lawrence Golan has been Director of Orchestral Studies and head of the graduate conducting program at the University of Denver since 2001. There he has won eight ASCAP Awards for Adventurous Programming of Contemporary Music, three Downbeat Magazine Awards for “Best College Symphony Orchestra,” and The American Prize for Orchestral Performance – Collegiate Division.
As a composer/arranger, Golan’s edition and reduced orchestration of Tchaikovsky’s The Nutcracker is published by Spurwink River Publishing and is used by orchestras and ballet companies across North America. His scholarly-performing edition of the solo violin works of J. S. Bach, which includes a handbook on Baroque Performance Practice, and The Lawrence Golan Violin Scale System are both published by Mel Bay Publications. Golan’s Fantasia for Solo Violin is published by Ludwig Music and won the Global Music Award for composition in 2011. A recording of the piece appears on the new CD Millennial Masters Vol. 9.
A native of Chicago, Lawrence Golan comes from a musical family – his father was a member of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra for forty-nine years (serving as Principal Second Violinist for thirty-five). Golan received his Bachelor of Music in Violin Performance and Master of Music in Violin Performance and Orchestral Conducting from the Indiana University School of Music and his D.M.A. in Violin Performance and Orchestral Conducting from the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston. In 1999 he was awarded Tanglewood Music Center’s Leonard Bernstein Conducting Fellowship, and in 2002, Aspen Music Festival’s Conducting Fellowship. Lawrence and his wife have two young children.
