One of the projects I most look forward to every season is the Valley of the Sun road tour the Phoenix Symphony embarks upon, bringing the complete Messiah or Highlights to area churches and venues. This December we will perform 10 concerts in 12 days from Litchfield Park in the West to Pinnacle Peak in the Northeast of the valley and everywhere in between.

I wouldn’t consider myself a particularly religious person, but the choral masterworks of composers like Bach, Handel and Mozart, among others, bring something out of me that I always find surprising. 

That composers are able to infuse their music with a degree of religious symbolism and devotion is a breathtaking revelation I am confronted with every time one of these performances begins. I still struggle to put my finger on it, but somehow the music allows me to connect with the painful humanity of Jesus’ experience while finding congregational comfort in his sacrifice. That’s certainly what these geniuses were hoping to allow the listener to experience.

That’s more philosophical on that specific topic than I normally prefer to explore, but it is an interesting personal fuel that burns inside me for the coming couple of weeks.

The Phoenix Symphony’s Baroque Initiative continues to be one of my happiest undertakings here. It is a time in the season where likeminded colleagues have volunteered to participate, and we’ve created a sound and evolving concept that is our own. None of us are academic experts in historical performance per se, but I’ve found plenty of material to shine a light on the wide path one can take. 

More than anything, it expands the musical horizons of those of us that participate and fundamentally changes how any of us approach Baroque and Classical Music. 

As a Music Director, how could I do something that is more artistically significant than lay a foundation that will be serve this repertoire for years to come?