New Beginnings and Inspiring Symbols

Fire inciting conflagration, effervescence…
Fire stimulating energy, light, explosions…
Fire creating chain reactions…

I am sitting here at home in Geneva, looking forward to my first season in Salt Lake City – another city ringed by spectacular mountains! – and working on the first programme I will conduct with the Utah Symphony this season…Fire..fireworks…firebird!

It is the start of a new season, with my new orchestra, soon to be my new home (at least for part of the year), as my wife and I will shortly move into our apartment in Salt Lake City; I feel at beginning of an adventure.  I simply can’t wait to start, conducting the first bar of Stravinsky’s Fireworks….  I believe in the importance and the strengths of symbols, and what an inspiring one with the idea of fire!

At the beginning of my tenure with USUO, it seems to me that my role should be as a catalyst, putting in place a chain-reaction full of dynamic and creative energy and new perspectives.

To start my first concert with Stravinsky’s burst of energy Fireworks is to me the perfect way to symbolise the endless possibilities of a new relationship;  as you will hear, in this work the sound of the orchestra resonates like a continuous electric charge; this vibrancy is what I hope we can achieve together in all our music-making.

The programme then moves on to Stravinsky’s Firebird.  Here we travel between two different worlds, the evil one of Kachtcheï the Magician, and the Firebird’s world of healing and goodness.  To me, what is extraordinary about Stravinsky is the way he creates a tremendous musical energy by placing different rhythms in direct opposition to each other.  Then, with incredible economy, he evolves these strong rhythmic patterns and creates new and vivid characters and moods from the same core material.  He doesn’t waste a thing!

What a goal – to achieve the same concentration of energy and unity of structure in my plans for the Utah Symphony! Wish me luck…

Thierry Fischer, 9.9.2010