LEADING FROM THE FRONT

From running efficient rehearsals to learning to speak to orchestras with clarity and empathy, an array of exciting courses for conductors has bloomed in recent years, finds Clare Stevens

- Clare Stevens

In this piece you may find it a matter of some difficulty to keep your places,' Sir Thomas Beecham is reputed to have said drily to an orchestra about to rehearse Sibelius's Lemminkäinen under his baton. 'You might do well to imagine yourselves disporting in some hair-raising form of locomotion such as Brooklands, or a switchback railway. My advice to you is merely: hold tight and do not let yourselves fall off. I cannot guarantee to help you on again.'

The anthology of Beecham anecdotes from which this one is taken is full of similar quotations, illustrating how a conductor's relationship with the musicians they are working with depends as much upon what they say as what they do on the podium. Can the necessary skills be taught, or are they best acquired through trial and error? In the past it was common to believe that conductors are born, not made, and careers were usually founded on a combination of apprenticeship and entrepreneurship, supplemented perhaps by attendance at a few summer schools. It's a different story today, with conservatoires and universities offering a variety of qualifications.

Enyi Okpara was appointed as the 2024/25 Calleva Assistant Conductor with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra last April, following a two-day competition process that took place while he was still completing an MA in Orchestral Conducting at London's Royal Academy of Music (RAM). Although he spent his teenage years in North London immersed in music, primarily as a percussionist and saxophonist with Camden Music Hub, Okpara's undergraduate degree from Bristol University is actually in law; but he was able to continue making music in Bristol, and the experience of graduating during the pandemic prompted him to rethink his priorities, commit himself to becoming a conductor, and enrol on the RAM course.