'Music will change you': After 2 big hires, Milwaukee Symphony ready to begin a new season

Before he talks about the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra's two big hires, or its new artistic partner who will extend the MSO's reach into the community, or even the sleeper program on the schedule he doesn't think you should miss, music director Ken-David Masur wants to impart his mission statement.

"What I want to reiterate in a new way, every year, is that we believe music will change you," Masur said during a recent interview. "We believe music will reflect something human about you that you will love, that you didn't know about, that you will discover, with the help of these performances."

The 2023-'24 season, which begins Sept. 22, combines "really recognizable standard repertoire masterpieces," Masur said, citing Beethoven's Fifth (Sept. 22-24) and Orff's choral masterpiece "Carmina Burana" (June 7-9) as examples, and accessible work by living composers that he thinks "everybody will actually enjoy."

Opening weekend at the Bradley Symphony Center is a microcosm of that programming approach, with Beethoven's Fifth; "Be Still," a new pandemic-inspired composition by Daniel Kidane; a selection of Schubert songs; and "The Soul's Expression," Jamaican-born contemporary composer Eleanor Alberga's setting of words by George Eliot, Emily Brontë and Elizabeth Barrett Browning. The vocal works will feature MSO's new artistic partner, bass-baritone Dashon Burton, a Grammy winner who teaches at Vanderbilt when he's not singing around the country. Not only will Burton return for concerts in March and June, he also will be part of MSO's teen choral program in February, singing with youth from area high schools.

New concertmaster Jinwoo Lee joins MSO

Violinist Jinwoo Lee joins the MSO this season as concertmaster, succeeding Frank Almond, who stepped down after the 2019-'20 season. (Associate concertmaster Ilana Setapen served as acting concertmaster in the interim and has returned to her prior role.) A native of South Korea, Lee had been first concertmaster of the Neue Philharmonie Westfalen in Germany.

"(Lee) is an extraordinary leader, extraordinary musician," Masur said.

As leader of the violins and strings, the concertmaster is "the conduit" between what Masur and other conductors intend on the podium and what is actually heard in the orchestra, Masur said.

"As conductors we don't make a sound; it's the concertmaster that actually breathes and gives the tone," he said.

As a violinist, the concertmaster also has moments as the lead voice in a musical composition, as in Rimsky-Korsakov's "Scheherazade," Masur noted.

New assistant conductor Ryan Tani will get lots of work

Unless something goes wrong, a backup quarterback rarely gets into a game. But Milwaukee and Wisconsin listeners will see plenty of Ryan Tani, the MSO's new assistant conductor, who will lead about 60 concerts this season, including youth, family and community engagement programs; Pops concerts; and films with live orchestra accompaniment. He'll also serve as cover conductor for programs led by Masur and guest conductors, ready to step in if they become indisposed.

"His audition was great … the orchestra played wonderfully with him," Masur said. He called Tani "a wonderful communicator" both on the podium with the orchestra and speaking to the audience, a quality Masur believes will serve Tani well in his educational role.

Less than a decade ago, Masur was assistant conductor of the Boston Symphony Orchestra, so he understands the many new experiences Tani will have. The music director also expects to ask for Tani's feedback on how the orchestra sounds in the newish concert hall.

Tani will begin his MSO tenure with a full immersion experience of Milwaukee culture, conducting the sold-out Oct. 3 Violent Femmes with orchestra concert.

Season's sleeper program has a Leipzig angle

Is there a sleeper program on the schedule whose allure might not be obvious to casual listeners, but is one Masur says people should not miss?

Yes, Masur said, immediately talking up the Feb. 2-3 program featuring Mozart's Symphony No. 35 ("Haffner") and Oboe Concerto, plus Max Reger's "Variations & Fugue on a Theme of Mozart," which draws on Mozart's Piano Sonata No. 11.

It's one of several programs this season that will feature orchestra members as soloists — in this case, principal oboist Katherine Young Steele (who listeners may remember played the first public notes in the Bradley Symphony Center during its unveiling concert on Feb. 6, 2021).

This year is Reger's sesquicentennial, Masur pointed out, leading the MSO and other orchestras to revisit his music. Reger was an important musician and composer in Leipzig, Germany, Masur's hometown. In his Mozart variations, Reger takes a "beautiful theme" from a piano piece and "creates these variations that are so colorful ... like a kaleidoscope of ideas," Masur said.

Bach Festival concerts packed with hits

Speaking of the great Leipziger, the MSO will feature a two-program Bach Festival March 22-24 (shrewd ticket buyers can opt for a doubleheader on March 23, hearing both programs that day).

Harpsichordist Mahan Esfahani and Baroque violinist Rachell Ellen Wong will join the orchestra to play three of Bach's Brandenburg concerti over the two programs. One program pairs two of the Brandenburgs with Bach's Suite No. 3, source of the famed "Air on the G string," which Procol Harum borrowed from for the opening of its hit "A Whiter Shader of Pale."

In period style, Masur won't be on the podium for the Brandenburgs; Esafahani and Wong will lead those works, the way musicians did in 1721. But on the second program, the choral-music-loving Masur will conduct the orchestra and Milwaukee Symphony Chorus in Bach's "Magnificat" in D Major. Closer to those concert dates, expect MSO announcements of Bach-related outreach and programming in the Milwaukee community.

If you go

Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra opens its season with concerts at 7:30 p.m. Sept. 22, 7 p.m. Sept. 23 and 2:30 Sept. 24 at the Bradley Symphony Center, 212 W. Wisconsin Ave. For tickets, visit mso.org or call (414) 291-7605.

More: 15 Milwaukee performing arts shows we're excited about this fall 2023

This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: After 2 big hires, Milwaukee Symphony ready to begin a new season