Acclaimed violinist Nancy Zhou had a day off on Wednesday while visiting San Antonio from her Bay Area home to perform with the San Antonio Philharmonic.
Zhou will perform as a soloist Friday and Saturday for the inaugural concerts of the orchestra’s third season, under the baton of new musical director Jeffrey Kahane.
The program centers on Johannes Brahms’ Violin Concerto in D major and includes British composer Benjamin Britten’s Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra.
To prepare, Zhou, who was born and raised in San Antonio until leaving for music studies at Harvard, said she’d practice for a few hours before meeting up with family friends.
“It’s always quite a treat to come back every now and then and have a homecoming of sorts, to catch up with old friends from high school,” she said. “And a number of them are coming [to the concerts], so I’m very excited.”
Deep local ties
Zhou attended Tejeda Middle School, then Ronald Reagan High School for two years, and easily recalls the names of her music teachers: Amy Williams at Tejeda and David McCutcheon at Reagan. She also performed for several years with the Youth Orchestras of San Antonio under the direction of Marlon Chen.
At age 13, Zhou performed as a soloist with the San Antonio Symphony and said the violinists she played with then are like family.
“Mary Ellen Goree, Alison Dawkins, Ken Freudigman, these [are] people I’ve known since I was a kid,” she said. “That they’re still part of this organization, so such a pivotal part of the community, is really special, it’s very touching. I can’t wait to reunite with them.”
Goree, currently the Philharmonic’s principal second violin, clearly recalls Zhou performing in a San Antonio Symphony Young People’s Concert at Reagan High School.
“She played beautifully,” Goree said. Afterward, Zhou performed a virtuoso Paganini Caprice for solo violin. “It was absolutely sparkling. … I remember turning to [fellow violinist] Karen Stiles after she had finished, and saying, ‘At no point in my life have I ever been able to do that.’”
Goree attributed the quality of Zhou’s playing to a combination of talent and “a lot of hard work behind that. … She’s a brilliant technician, but there’s also heart in her playing. It’s magnificent.”
Unfolding a new chapter
Zhou said one thing she appreciates about the Brahms concerto is that the soloist and orchestra are on equal footing.
“Each part of the orchestra has quite a critical role in the music making,” she said, which differs from the usual role of the orchestra as accompanying the featured soloist.
“It’s kind of a symbolic homecoming as well, just to allow so many other parts of the orchestra to communicate together on the same level as I am,” Zhou said.
Similarly, Zhou said Britten’s Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra is musical “democracy at work.” She explained, “each voice, each section, each instrument, has such a pivotal role in conveying a broader message. And there’s communion, there is dialogue, there’s sometimes friction in between, there’s conflict.”
Britten composed the piece for a 1946 educational film, with each section of the orchestra highlighted to help identify the separate instruments before they are brought together in grand, symphonic unity.
“It’s a very palatable entryway to the significance and the special quality of an orchestra and how they work together to create this huge swath of sound,” Zhou said.
And having performed with the Philharmonic during its inaugural season under a guest conductor, she looks forward to performing the season opening concerts with new music director Kahane.
“It’s definitely a powerful way to unfold a new chapter,” Zhou said.
Tickets to the Friday and Saturday Classics I concerts at First Baptist Church are available through the San Antonio Philharmonic website.
