This week on the podcast is part two of our interview with British conductor, Timothy Redmond. He’s a regular guest conductor with the London Symphony Orchestra and the Manchester Camerata, and Professor of Conducting at the Guildhall School of London and a visiting tutor at the Royal Academy of Music. Tim is also the Principal Conductor of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra’s Know The Score ®concerts and Co-Creator of Royal Albert Hall’s My Great Orchestral Adventure.™ Passionate about training future conductors, is the co-founder of the international conducting course "And Other Duties."
In this episode:
We take a thrilling journey into Redmond's creative process, how he brings concerts alive and makes the orchestra the star of the show - all with a dash of imagination. Our conversation doesn't stop at the art of music, we also dive into the heart of music education and the future of orchestras. Tim shares his unique approach to conducting family and education shows, revealing how to strike a balance that allows both the orchestra and presenter to shine. We also hit on the changing tides of classical music and the art of networking for young conductors. But we don't shy away from the hard parts - managing difficult musicians, the role of psychology in it, and the challenges of being an arts entrepreneur. Yet, with Tim's invaluable artistic and entrepreneurial advice, we learn that the rewards are worth the hurdles, and above all, the importance of making arts accessible to all. So sit back and let the orchestra play on!
This week on the podcast is part two of our interview with British conductor, Timothy Redmond. He’s a regular guest conductor with the London Symphony Orchestra and the Manchester Camerata, and Professor of Conducting at the Guildhall School of London and a visiting tutor at the Royal Academy of Music. Tim is also the Principal Conductor of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra’s Know The Score ®concerts and Co-Creator of Royal Albert Hall’s My Great Orchestral Adventure.™ Passionate about training future conductors, is the co-founder of the international conducting course "And Other Duties."
In this episode:
We take a thrilling journey into Redmond's creative process, how he brings concerts alive and makes the orchestra the star of the show - all with a dash of imagination. Our conversation doesn't stop at the art of music, we also dive into the heart of music education and the future of orchestras. Tim shares his unique approach to conducting family and education shows, revealing how to strike a balance that allows both the orchestra and presenter to shine. We also hit on the changing tides of classical music and the art of networking for young conductors. But we don't shy away from the hard parts - managing difficult musicians, the role of psychology in it, and the challenges of being an arts entrepreneur. Yet, with Tim's invaluable artistic and entrepreneurial advice, we learn that the rewards are worth the hurdles, and above all, the importance of making arts accessible to all. So sit back and let the orchestra play on!
Welcome to the Arts Entrepreneurship Podcast. Making Art Work. We highlight how entrepreneurs align their artistry, passion and vision to create and pursue opportunities to capture value in the arts. The views expressed by guests on the Arts Entrepreneurship Podcast are solely their own and do not necessarily represent the views of the podcast or its hosts. The appearance of a guest on the podcast, the venture they represent or reference to any product or service does not imply an endorsement or recommendation by the podcast or its hosts. The content provided is for entertainment and informational purposes only and does not constitute business advice. Here are your hosts Andy Heise and Nick Petrella.
Andy Heise:Hi Arts Entrepreneurship Podcast listeners. My name is Andy Heise and I'm Nick.
Nick Petrella:Petrella, we're really excited to have conductor Timothy Redmond on the podcast. He's a regular guest conductor with the London Symphony Orchestra and the Manchester Camerada and professor of conducting at the Guildhall School of London and a visiting tutor at the Royal Academy of Music. Tim is also the principal conductor of the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra's Know the Score concerts and co-creator of Royal Albert Hall's my Great Orchestral Adventure. Passionate about training future conductors, he's the co-founder of the International Conducting Course and Other Duties. We'll link to all of his websites in the show notes so you can learn more about Tim and what he's been doing. Thanks for being with us Tim.
Timothy Redmond:It's a great pleasure. Thank you for inviting me.
Andy Heise:As the father of a four-year-old, the Royal Albert Hall's my Great Orchestral Adventure concert series you co-created looks like a lot of fun. Can you tell us about how that?
Timothy Redmond:came to be Absolutely and don't restrict it to being a father of a four-year-old. I find there's no limit to the age range.
Andy Heise:That's the lens I view everything through right now, funnily enough.
Timothy Redmond:So, yeah, that's a good lens, actually, because All right. So my brother, tom Redmond, was a horn player for many years in the Hallé Orchestra. He's now joint principal of Cheetham's School of Music in Manchester, but as well he's presented hundreds, if not thousands, of concerts and broadcast on Radio 3. And he and I have had parallel careers, because I've always presented family concerts From the very beginning. It's been something I've understood and I've enjoyed, and I've encouraged organisations that I've been involved with to think creatively and that business of thinking creatively. I came to realise that putting on family and education concerts is some of the most creative and inventive work that you can do. There's a certain format to most classical concerts, and I know a lot of people have talked about fighting against it or reinventing it. But for good or for ill, classical concert feels a certain way for a lot of people, whereas with an audience of young people everything is new. And so there's another similarity as a conductor of contemporary music, I'm often premiering stuff that's never been heard. Well, when you play to four-year-olds and eight-year-olds, everything's a world premiere to those years, and so there's a responsibility and an excitement and a possibility about that thought. So Tom and I both had these similar experiences and I invited him to create a concert with me. I used to run an orchestra in Cambridge and we did it and it went very well. And we pitched it to the Royal Albert Hall and they said, yes, we like that idea, why don't you come and do it here? And it went on sale in the summer and I think it was an October half-term holiday and it had sold out by the beginning of September two shows in one day and we thought we hadn't done it yet and we thought, ok, we might be on to something here. Anyway, we've done a number of shows for them now over the last six, seven years and we go back every year. We do one or two different shows. We've been doing a Christmas show quite a lot in the last few years and that's gone elsewhere as well.
Timothy Redmond:When you're putting on a concert in a regular concert hall, you might have a little bit of potential with the lighting. You might have a little bit of possibility about using the space. When you go to the Royal Albert Hall that seats five or six thousand people and they have a lighting rig about which you can only dream and a sound system second to none, now, then it gets exciting. And when you say things like would it be possible to have some pyrotechnics just before the snow drop, and they go, yeah sure, then it's exciting. Would you like the close encounters lighting effect when you're implying the spaceship is taking off? Yeah, that would be lovely. Thank you very much indeed. So that level of creativity and fun, let's not deny it, it is enormous fun. That has been a total joy.
Timothy Redmond:But my brother and I have a very, very similar approach, and that is that the concert is all about the orchestra. The orchestra is the star of the show. We come up with some crazy idea of mild perils. Something goes wrong. We need to fix something. Santa Claus has dropped his map oh no, we need to get it back to him. The conductor has lost his baton oh no, we need to find it we're shipwrecked.
Timothy Redmond:Oh no, how will we get home? So it's a standard sort of narrative, known to everybody who reads stories to four-year-olds. But our approach is that the orchestra is the star of the show, and, lighting effects aside, the props are designed to be anything from your imagination that you could make at home. So it's a cardboard box, it's a bike. It's so simple, because the music takes us to these imaginary places and it's the imaginations of the young audience that we're trying to inspire. We're not trying to blind them with an amazing show. The Amazing is a 70-piece orchestra playing their socks off through. You know, we've done the right of spring, we've done Firebird, we've done John Williams. I mean, everything has been in those shows at some point or another, and that's the lovely thing. There isn't a wrong kind of music as long as it's exciting and as long as it fits the narrative.
Nick Petrella:So you're really big into education and I know that's an important aspect for you. Tell us why you created and Other Duties and what you cover in the course.
Timothy Redmond:And Other Duties came about because of conversations with a lot of young conductors and a lot of orchestra managers and directors, and the young conductors were going help I don't know how to do all of these things that is being asked of me and the education directors or the concert managers were going. I don't understand why is it that these young conductors get booked and they don't know how to do this thing they've never done before. And so then a third conversation started to take place with other conducting teachers at leading institutions who said I wish we had the time to teach these skills on our course. We don't. Thank goodness somebody is. So this has come about. I mean, a lot of it is my personal experience of learning on the job and asking myself did I have to learn all of that by making public mistakes or, you know, in front of the orchestra or whatever it might be? And the answer sometimes is yes, you just do, but actually no. If there was a way to learn how to work in the studio, how to conduct a film, how to do an opera gala, how to do a pop's concert on one three hour rehearsal or one, two and a half hour rehearsal and we're about to launch this. We've already got four or five courses planned for the next two years, but the first one subject close to my heart is all about music education how to write a family show, how to write an education show, what the difference is between those.
Timothy Redmond:How to behave differently If you're presenting it and you have soul, creative charge, or if you are just a conductor and somebody else has come up with all the ideas. How do you behave in front of the orchestra? How do you get the best out of them whilst allowing the presenter to shine and also do the job of entertaining the children? So that's how it started, and my colleague, karen Nivrin, had some interesting conversations with conductors in the US who were applying for their first jobs going. How is it? You've done all of these things already and we just realised that many people don't Now.
Timothy Redmond:It's interesting because in the UK is a very, very healthy amateur or community orchestra scene. Many of the orchestras are at an absolutely professional level or pretty close to it, and also some phenomenal youth orchestras, and there is great opportunity as a conductor who is developing in their 20s to conduct a massive amount of repertoire in all kinds of concerts. That doesn't happen everywhere in the world and you can go to an American university and have fantastic experience doing your first degree, your master's, your doctorate, and not leave the confines of that amazing institution. It's got to be that you learn from lots of people. That's the way it goes. And now our courses are not about how to conduct Brahms 2. Though that might come into it. It's about applying your skills to different jobs and networking. So in all our courses we're inviting industry leaders from all over the world to either join us in person or online and just talk frankly, really behind closed doors. Well, what is it that I need to do, asks the student, and then they get the honest answer, and sometimes it's unexpected.
Nick Petrella:I bet. A lot of times it's unexpected. Yeah, absolutely.
Timothy Redmond:But, look, it's exciting to be doing it. It's interesting that it's cropped up. There are a couple of other organizations just starting to do this, which I see as a very good thing, because it means it's something that's wanted, that's needed and it's a totally international thing. And look, let's face it, the classical music world needs to do everything it can to encourage people to play music and to come to concerts, and that involves all aspects of community work, of education work, and it's not possible unless you are one of the few exceptional individuals, it's not possible not to come into contact with all of that.
Timothy Redmond:I've just spent the most extraordinary month with the London Symphony Orchestra doing a whole bunch of projects, but last night I was doing a showcase of all of their education work or not all some of their education work. So we had an un-auditioned children's choir. We had community outreach projects in East London schools with kids who weren't particularly high flyers but they wanted to be part of it. We had the intermediate level. We had the Guild or orchestral artistry students involved and we had the most extraordinary group of adults with special educational needs who had spent months working on this improvised piece that was then orchestrated and it was one of the most moving things I can remember just seeing the joy on their faces of being part of this and the concentration of playing with this world-class orchestra just next to them. That, as an orchestral player, is part of the everyday, and so, as a conductor, it needs to be part, if not your everyday, then at least your general experience. You need to understand why this is important and you need to understand how best to do it.
Andy Heise:What have been the most significant changes to the concert music world since you first started conducting?
Timothy Redmond:Goodness, that's a very interesting question, I think. Okay, so I have observed, I'm going to talk about the UK and I have experience of this in the US and in Europe, but let me just talk about the UK. Sure, there was a post-war wish to make culture available to everybody. There were two reports by the Gulbenkian Foundation in the late 60s and early 70s that recommended that instrumental tuition should be provided free of charge to school children and that youth orchestras should be funded. And it happened. And those youth orchestras produced players who are still in the profession today. It was an extraordinary time and we are still blessed by that investment.
Timothy Redmond:Then, I mean, I had a little bit of it in the 1980s. You know, I got free double bass lessons at school, which was an extraordinary thing. I learned to play jazz. I learned to play in a big band. I played the orchestral repertoire. It was my third instrument, but the lessons were free. But the advantages I got from that I still am grateful for today. My knowledge of the string repertoire wouldn't have happened unless I'd had those chances then. And little by little, that funding was cut, and the funding to education was cut and the funding to culture was cut, and despite that we still have this extraordinary, world-class orchestra.
Timothy Redmond:I'm going to talk about orchestra scene if you like, but orchestra scene in the UK. That is hanging on by its fingernails and through the title of your podcast, the entrepreneurship of those who run these organisations. They've had to go from doing classical concerts, because of course everybody wants classical concerts, to a much more commercially minded way of thinking. So I have seen orchestras that I've worked with for 20 or more years go from playing a lot of Haydn and Mozart to absolutely almost none of that because they can't sell the tickets and nobody is funding that. We've even watched in Germany, the best funded of all the countries for arts and culture, and particularly orchestras and opera houses. Even there some of their great orchestras are starting to be at risk or have already folded.
Timothy Redmond:So what have I seen? What are the differences? That you can't take anything for granted. That you can't presume that the public at large, through the politicians, understands why something should be funded. That many more people will go and see a contemporary ballet and sell it out than they will a contemporary music concert. That billions upon billions of people around the world hear the sound of an orchestra in their ears every single day in advertisements, in movies, on TV, on the radio and video games. It is the soundtrack to our life. But the tiniest proportion of those people go to a concert.
Timothy Redmond:And in the UK there's an interesting thing that there's this kind of an imagined snobbery, if you like, about what classical music is all about. And the reverse is in fact true, because there is arts council subsidy. It means the ticket prices are so much lower to go and see a world-class orchestra than to go and see a West End show or very often go and see a film in the cinema. And it's crazy that there's this perception In Europe. Audiences applaud when a politician comes to an opera and so they go. It's very good for them, their ego, their following and all the rest of it. In the UK politicians are terrified to be seen at the opera, just in case somebody writes something snarky in the newspapers about it. It's the most extraordinary thing. And yet this is music that we listen to all the time. What's that narrative Very peculiar?
Nick Petrella:Yeah, you know you kind of hit on the next question here, which is for as long as I can remember, orchestras have had to deal with financial hardship, and I should mention orchestras in the United States. In fact, over the years many orchestras have folded. What can be done to help orchestras thrive into the future?
Timothy Redmond:I think you've got to understand your marketplace as well as your product. It's it's. There's no right to succeed, is there and you watch. You watch ensembles that once were held in very high esteem just slowly drop, not to do with the level of their artistry, but just how they are perceived, and very often it's because another group has come along. That is surely a healthy thing, even if it's a sad thing when you lose a really well-loved ensemble. I think there's an element of you've got to reinvent yourself. For I mean, look, if you're trading on a hundred years of brilliance and you may, you've maintained your kind of global reach and and how you're appreciated, then obviously that is a fabulous thing. But you've got to look and think well, how do we persuade those people who will happily pay $300 to go and see a pop concert to come and spend a fraction of that on an orchestra concert? And we've got to ask ourselves are we partly to blame for making them unwelcome? We might think the answer is no, but those are the questions that have to be asked.
Timothy Redmond:So how can orchestras continue to make themselves relevant, needed, financially viable and so on? I mean, obviously the financial models are very different in each of the countries, and in the US we are reliant on the extraordinary generosity of individual donors and corporations and a certain number of you know award-giving bodies in Europe. I, you know, I've done stuff in Italy and Austria that has been so unbelievably generously funded that it doesn't really matter who comes to the performance, because it's everybody's job. But sometimes that's disappointing because you've worked extremely hard and there's only 20 people to witness your hard work In the UK. It's an interesting middle ground between the kind of the more generous European approach to funding and where we are in the US. So let's just pivot ever so slightly from orchestras and talk about opera companies.
Timothy Redmond:I went to a really interesting conference in New York a few years ago that Opera America were hosting, and one of the topics of conversations was programming, and a lot of regional opera companies were finding that instead of the third revival of Rigoletto that once upon a time would have done good business, now their audiences are more interested in a new piece that's relevant to that audience today, and so commissions were happening in far greater number, and it's been fascinating to see the mighty Met suddenly announce that that is exactly what they're doing over the next few years because they've done such good business the ticket sales for well, a whole number of operas that have been on recently have been for the new pieces, the contemporary pieces.
Timothy Redmond:I'm not sure that an orchestra would be able to do exactly the same, but there's an equivalent. So it's just finding your place and knowing your community, knowing your patrons, knowing their curiosity and encouraging it, and this is where the personality of the person who's leading artistically makes a difference, because it goes back to what I was saying about the beginner conductors If you have a passion for something that you can share with other people, you are likely to succeed. If, as a music director or as a chief conductor, artistic director, you can share your passion with your audience, hopefully and most likely, that's gonna turn into ticket sales. It's not a given, though, and it's a lazy assumption to think that what sold 20 years ago is going to sell equally today.
Andy Heise:Yeah, it's sort of a I don't know if you're running those organizations and you're saying we're gonna do this instead of something that we've been doing, which I think that's sort of the risk that they have to address. Right, but in that there is risk. We've been doing this this way for whatever 100 years or whatever long, but we have to break that tradition to try something new, and I think that's often the challenge.
Timothy Redmond:Absolutely, and it's that whole thing. How long do you hold something that has worked in the same format before it's going to be necessary to change? If you look at the programs from 100 years ago or back into the 19th century, it's fascinating. They'll start with a good, meaty symphony Beethoven 5, something light to start the concert. Then you might have a little overture and then a concerto. Then, after the interval, perhaps there'll be a couple of songs accompanied on the piano and then a few orchestral lollipops and then another overture that everybody knows and loves, and three hours after the concert began you might think about making your way home.
Timothy Redmond:The pandemic made us realize that people really like an hour of content and then they can go home early. So what a difference that is. Once upon a time I've worked for promoters who cannot conceive of putting less than 95 minutes of music into a program because they fear that their audience's wish for value for money is such that they'll feel short-changed. And that will have come from experience and knowledge and audience analysis. But I think it's changed. I think people are happy to experience a cultural event if you like and still have time for dinner or the last train home or whatever it might be.
Nick Petrella:Sure, a lot of what we spoke about today not all, but a lot it's technical skills and things like that. So I'm gonna ask you a soft-skill question. Soloists and musicians in general can sometimes be demanding and, at times, difficult. Have you ever had to deal with a difficult musician or difficult musicians, and how did you help them agree on a common vision?
Timothy Redmond:Without a doubt, I've experienced all of those singular and plural versions that you just listed. Look, conducting like any kind of leadership is about understanding psychology and people. If somebody is upset or angry or frustrated, you have to ask yourself why Is it to do with this moment? Is this a repeat of something's happened many, many times? Is this to somebody at the top of their game who feels their time is being wasted? Or is this somebody who remembers being at the top of their game and is now terrified that they're not? Is this somebody who's worked way too hard and the last thing they need is to be put under the spotlight about this, that or the other? And sometimes you've just got to read the room.
Timothy Redmond:If an orchestra has played something in a certain way for many years under many great conductors and you come in with the best will in the world with a whole bunch of ideas and not enough rehearsal time, maybe just do it as they always do, so choose your battles.
Timothy Redmond:But I think understanding why people react in the way they do usually solves the problem. I've done stuff. I've worked with orchestras and I've been on a 9 am rehearsal and I look at their schedule and I see they've just gotten off a very late night flight. They all have got one or two. They all had to go home and then they had to be. So if you know that, you can behave in a way that allows everybody to deal with the fact that they're jet, lagged and exhausted and all the rest of it. So it's listening, it's observing and it's understanding. So in all of those cases that you've asked about the hypotheticals, I usually I've understood why somebody has been upset or cross or frustrated, and sometimes, yes, it's because I have been too in years gone by, it's because I've been too inexperienced and I've never encountered this particular thing before. But as the years go on, you understand what it might all be about.
Nick Petrella:Yeah, great.
Andy Heise:Well, Tim, we've reached the point of the interview where we ask all of our interviewees the same three questions, and the first question is what advice would you give to others wanting to become an art entrepreneur?
Timothy Redmond:If you can do anything else in life, do it. If you have to be an arts entrepreneur, then be it, because it's the most satisfying thing, combining the love of an art form that, come on, it obsesses us, which all we can think about is our art form, in whatever way it might be, it's our passion, it's the thing that drives us, and that wish to share is why the entrepreneurship thing can happen. But it also makes a great hobby, and then let other people do it as well. Yeah, sure.
Nick Petrella:What can we do to ensure the arts are more accessible and reaching the widest possible audience?
Timothy Redmond:The most important thing is to make people feel welcome, to make them feel that the arts are for them, and for me, the most important way of doing that is to start as young as possible. If a young person has walked into a theater or a concert hall or a library or an art gallery, whatever it might be, they feel at home. That's a place they know and understand and you hope they feel comfortable in and want to come back to. If you spent your life never experiencing that, I can understand why there might be some kind of apprehension about opening that door to a concert hall. But the truth is a concert hall's just like a movie theater the chairs are very similar, for a start, and you often have orchestras playing just not quite as loudly in the concert hall. So what can we do to ensure this for the future is invest in education and just share our love for the arts.
Andy Heise:Lastly, what's the best artistic or entrepreneurial advice you've ever been given?
Timothy Redmond:I had the extraordinary opportunity some years ago of assisting Sir Colin Davis on the very last performance he ever gave with the London Symphony Orchestra and it was my job just to ensure that he could convey all the information to the very large forces of the Berlioz Requiem that was going on in St Paul's Cathedral. But I remember talking to him in the dressing room between rehearsal and performance and he talked about conducting the Mozart Requiem as an older man and how he found it increasingly difficult because he kept forgetting that you had to conduct it, because he was so moved by the music itself. And I remember thinking, my goodness me, if I can get through 50 or 60 years of music making and still feel moved to tears by the music that has surrounded me my whole life, then if that's not a piece of advice, then I don't know what is. It was a touching moment and I've never forgotten that idea.
Nick Petrella:Tim, this has been great having you on the podcast and it's been great hearing how much listening and empathy shapes your thinking. You gave a lot of young musicians much to think about. Thank you so much.
Timothy Redmond:It's been a great pleasure being on the show. Thanks.
Announcer:Thanks for listening. If you like this podcast, please subscribe. Visit artsentrepreneurshippodcastcom to learn more about our guests and how you can help support artists, the arts and this podcast. We want to tell you the secrets of the etwas mas.