KENT NAGANO NOT DONE YET
Will conduct OSM at least one more time next year
Orchestre symphonique de Montréal music director Kent Nagano will make at least one last appearance with the orchestra next season. OSM CEO Madeleine Careau said Nagano will conduct the Montreal orchestra at the Maison symphonique, their home base, next season, but she can’t say when or what the program will include. The concert will be officially announced in the next two weeks.
Nagano’s contract as OSM music director ends on Aug. 31 and the Berkeley, Calif.-born conductor was supposed to wrap his tenure here with a free gala concert outside Olympic Stadium on Aug. 9.
But that show was cancelled, along with all other sports and cultural events this summer, as a result of Quebec government regulations spurred by the COVID -19 pandemic.
Nagano has been at his home in Paris throughout the pandemic and will be conducting a concert next week with the Radio-france Orchestra, but without the public in attendance.
Careau said it was tough to have to cancel his farewell show at the Big O.
“It’s heartbreaking because Montrealers so love Kent Nagano and he so much loves Montreal,” Careau said in a phone interview Friday. “So we wanted him to say goodbye to us in a magistral way, and all of that fell apart because of the virus. He was very sad for a while, at the beginning. But there’s some hope. One day we’re going to get over the virus and Kent Nagano will still be a conductor and we will still have an orchestra. So they’ll get back together for sure. Not maybe. Maybe we’ll have him back regularly. But for sure we’ll see Kent Nagano back here.”
Nagano will also be saying goodbye via social media. There will be an event on the OSM Facebook page at 11 a.m. EST on Sunday in which the music director will be answering questions from the public and looking back on his career with the Montreal orchestra, which he joined as music director in 2006. He will be appearing live from his home in Paris, with Radio-canada’s Katerine Verebely hosting.
The OSM will be announcing its upcoming season in the next two weeks and they will be planning to have concerts without audiences.
“As soon as the government will say ‘go’ we will be able to do it,” Careau said. “We’re ready to do it.”
Normally, the OSM performs around 100 concerts per season at the Maison symphonique, but Careau says that will drop to between 50 and 60 concerts next season. That’s because the orchestra is looking at a major drop in revenue given there will probably be no audience. Even if there is an audience, it will be at about 20-percent capacity in order to fulfil social-distancing measures. Careau said they will allow 350 people in the 2,000-seat hall. There will also be fewer musicians on stage because of those rules. Instead of 90 to 100 musicians, they will have 40 to 45 musicians
The OSM performed on Wednesday at the Maison symphonique for the first time since the start of the pandemic. There was no audience, but a video of the concert is available at osm.ca.
The OSM has been hit hard financially by the crisis. It lost 75 per cent of its season, including numerous concerts it performs every summer across Quebec.