Preview of Vancouver Symphony's Holiday Concert

Columbia Dance - Swan Lake

It’s that cold and rainy time of the year, when we are seeking some warmth and the glow of optimism to cheer us up. Fortunately, the Vancouver Symphony’s annual Holiday Concert is the perfect antidote for anyone who may be under the weather. The upcoming concerts (November 14 and 15) at Skyview Concert Hall offer an excellent musical chestnuts and contemporary pieces that you can cozy up to.

Suite from “Swan Lake” with Columbia Dance

The VSO will collaborate with the Columbia Dance to present a suite from Tchaikovsky’s “Swan Lake,” one of the greatest ballets ever written. This is a return engagement for Columbia Dance, which presented excerpts from "Swan Lake” in 2018 and from “The Nutcracker” in 2019.

“To accommodate the dancers, a stage extension will be built at the front of the stage, and it will extend about eight feet into the seating area,” said Becky Moore, Director of Columbia Dance, during a phone call. “Combined with the seven feet that we have on the regular stage, we will have 15 feet of actual stage to work with.”

“We are building the stage next Tuesday from 10 pm to 2 am,” added Moore. “That’s when time allows in the schedule. Then we will lay down the Marley Dance floor, and we will work on spacing at Thursday and Friday night dress rehearsals. The dancers will perform ‘The Nutcracker’ the following weekend (Nov. 20-22) at Skyview also.”

Moore has been leading Columbia Dance for the past five years and has an extensive professional dance portfolio with many companies, including The Cincinnati Ballet, Pittsburgh Ballet, Ballet West, The Washington Ballet, and Marin Ballet. She has choreographed the excerpts from “Swan Lake.”

“We have 36 dancers - ages 11 to 18 - performing with the orchestra,” said Moore. “But they will not be on stage at the same time. It’s about 8 on stage at any given moment – with 16 during some entrances and exits. It’s pretty tight, but we have rehearsed it well. The performance will involve all of our Company dancers, which is our most advanced group – 28 of them. And then our Level 5 dancers – 8 of them.”

Because they will dance “The Nutcracker” the following weekend, Moore had to give the VSO concert a lot of thought before committing to it.

“At first when I was approached about the VSO performance, I thought ‘No!’ remarked Moore. “We still have three dancers with us from the 2019 experience with the VSO, and they recalled how the music just took over their whole bodies. It was just so powerful to have that wave of live sound right there instead of a recording. So we decided to be crazy and different and go for it! The opportunity to give these kids a real live orchestra is just so rare – that makes it all the more compelling and worthwhile. They will never forget it.”

Guest Conductor Farkhad Khudyev

Making his debut on the podium will be Farkhad Khudyev, who is the Music Director of the University of Texas Symphony Orchestra and the Assistant Professor of Music in Orchestral Studies at the University of Texas at Austin, as well as the Music Director of the Orchestral Institute at the Hidden Valley Institute of the Arts in Carmel, California. He recently made his conducting debut with the Eugene Symphony, where he is one of the finalists vying to become its next music director.

Born in Turkmenistan to a family of non-musicians, Khudyev has a Masters in Orchestral Conducting from Yale University.

“My father was an economist and mother was a cardiologist,” said Khudvey via Zoom. My younger brother, Emil Khudyev, is associate principal clarinetist and has his Master’s degree from Yale where he studied with clarinetist David Shifrin. My older brother, Eldar Hudiyev, is a professional violinist and composer in Bellevue, Washington. He wrote “Circus,” which the Vancouver Symphony will play in the Holiday Concert. That will be its Pacific Northwest premiere.”

Khudyev’s family hosted Peace Corp volunteers from the U.S. He and Emil became the first music students from Turkmenistan to receive scholarships to attend Interlochen. Farkhad was there for three years as a violinist before matriculating to Oberlin Conservatory for his Bachelors and then to Yale for his Masters.

“The Holiday Concert program with the Vancouver Symphony is a bit eclectic but flows beautifully well together,” noted Khudyev. “I have conducted all of the pieces before. We will open with Suppé’s ‘Light Cavalry Overture,’ which I have done with the Seattle Symphony in a Family Concert series. It has a balance between the lyrical and fanfare. I’ve conducted Tchaikovsky’s ballet, and I love to collaborate with youth. Tchaikovsky wrote what we call eternal music. I suggested the Florence Price’s ‘Dances in the Canebrakes.’ It is just a phenomenal piece that she wrote towards the end of her life. It was orchestrated by William Grant Still. I have conducted it with my orchestra in Texas and with the Boston Symphony.”

Khudyev is looking forward to the three pieces with Shifrin as soloist.

“John Williams’ ‘Viktor's Tale’ from the movie ‘The Terminal is a wonderful number,” said Khudyev. “We will also do Michele Mangani‘s ‘Blues from American in Paris.’ It starts like ‘Rhapsody in Blue’ then goes into themes from American in Paris. Eldar’s ‘Circus’ is a metaphor for life. It’s a short piece that travels long distances. At the premiere in Austin I told the audience to buckle your ear bells because you will experience quite a bit in a short period. From divine places you appear in a bar with a piano – crude and raw music. We will follow that with some traditional favorites, Leroy Anderson’s ‘Christmas Festival’ and ‘Sleigh Ride’ and a couple of favorites from Johann Strauss Jr and Johann Strauss Sr. “

Guest Clarinetist David Shifrin

Legendary clarinetist Shifrin last appeared with the VSO in 2017, playing pieces by Carl Maria von Weber and Giachino Rossini. He is well-known for his long tenure as Artistic Director of Chamber Music Northwest, but his acclaim extends internationally through his extensive concertizing and discography, which includes multiple Grammy nominations.

On tap to perform the pieces by Williams, Hudiyev, and Mangani, Shifrin noted during a phone call that this will be his first time to perform these pieces.

“It keeps me going to play new things,” said Shifrin. “I have seen the movie, ‘The Terminal’ and I knew the clarinetist, Emily Bernstein, who played the score for the movie. I played in the studios in L. A. for a several years. ‘Circus’ is a real romp. It’s a new piece that I have not heard until Farkhad sent the score to me. His younger brother was my clarinet student, and now I’m doing the music of his older brother. At Yale, I coached Emil and Farkhad in the Brahms ‘Clarinet Quintet.’ Emil was the clarinetist and Farkhad played first violin.

“In 2019, we had a big clarinet celebration at Chamber Music Northwest,” added Shifrin. “Michele Mangani arranged a blues version of Gershwin's ‘An American in Paris’ but this will be my experience with the orchestral version. It has a couple of excerpts from ‘Rhapsody in Blue’ and then a whole Blues exposition on ‘American in Paris.’”

I had to ask him how many clarinets he owns.

“I don’t know,” chuckled Shifrin. “I’ll have to take an inventory.”

“I’m playing on a clarinet that was made in Vancouver. B. C.,” he added, “A Backun clarinet.”

“What kind of reeds do you use?” I asked.

“Over the last several years, I have been using synthetic reeds made by Guy Légère,” answered Shifrin. “It is made of a special polymer that vibrates just line cane. You don’t have to scrape them. That has given me a lot of time back. I don’t have to be a carpenter.”

PS: Sunday’s performance of the Holiday Concert is Sold Out, and there are only a few tickets remaining for the concert on Saturday.