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Does anyone here no of any notable conductors who were or are tuba players? I've noticed that a lot orchestral conductors today are pianist and violinists, for the most part. The only conductor I've seen that I thought was a tubist was the conductor of the Jack Daniel's Silver Cornet Band.
Thanks, Aaron H.

tubafatness wrote:Does anyone here no of any notable conductors who were or are tuba players?

Depending upon what you consider "notable," Roger Bobo immediately comes to mind.

There are tubists who, due to their academic positions, serve as conductors, such as John Stevens, Winston Morris, Sam Pilafian, etc.

There are also tubists who, although they occasionally conduct, are better known as composers, e.g. James Barnes, Philip Wilby, Steven Winteregg, etc.

The only conductor I've seen that I thought was a tubist was the conductor of the Jack Daniel's Silver Cornet Band.

If you're going to include Brass Band conductors, you have to list Steve Sykes, James Gourlay, and TubeNet's own Tony Z!

Bramwell Tovey, ex tubist, composer of many fine works, but especially for brass band (this years British Open piece "A Night To Sing") and also conductor of the Vancouver Symphony.

Bramwell Tovey, the outstanding British conductor, works internationally with a prestigious list of orchestras - including the New York Philharmonic, Toronto Symphony, Montreal Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra - in addition to his music directorships with the Vancouver Symphony and the Luxembourg Philharmonic Orchestra.

Skoken (or not) with true brevity Windshieldbug.

I meant to say sPoken, not skoken...obviously not with brevity.

bloke wrote:I have no idea if that music director is still there, but I believe the conductor at Winnipeg is (was?) a baritone player...

bloke "who was a finalist for that job years and years ago, but (ignorantly) chose to play the Bydlo solo on F tuba "

I think it might have been Bramwell Tovey; (and see post above). I recall hearing recently that he was conducting NY Phil (at least I think that is what I heard...).


[Out of curiosity, Bloke: what year would you have been at that audition? Somewhere around 88--90'ish?]

bloke wrote:bloke "who was a finalist for that job years and years ago, but (ignorantly) chose to play the Bydlo solo on F tuba "

Okay, I'll bite. What should you have played Bydlo on?

Steve Marcus wrote:If you're going to include Brass Band conductors, you have to list Steve Sykes, James Gourlay, and TubeNet's own Tony Z!

I believe that George Hespe was another. And if you include euphoniums in the broad category of "tubas", the Childs brothers, of course.

The orchestra director from Texas Tech was a tuba player.

bloke wrote:

Mark wrote:Okay, I'll bite. What should you have played Bydlo on?

the friggin' Yamaha bariphone that I owned a the time, o' course!

Bloke: what year would you have been at that audition? Somewhere around 88--90'ish? Wondering if some of the folks here were there at the same one.

SJSUW wrote:Mr. Keating Johnson

Yes, absolutley!

bloke wrote:(brrrrrrrrRRRR!!!!!!

Yeah! And that was during their few yearly days of "warm" weather

[I flew in a couple of days ahead; and from the 'scratchy throat' that was gowing from the instant I took off in from southwestern US 'til the time when I landed there (including the multiple connections) with the worst head cold I've ever had in my entire life, it was scripted to be nothing but a 'sport audition']

In hindsight, the best possible result was not winding up staying there



(However, met a lot of nice tuba playin' folks at the post-audition 'debriefing/beerfest' )

Also, I read somewhere that Toscanini wanted to be a tuba player. But, I don't think he actually was one.

Matt Garbutt is the tubist in the San Diego Symphony and is also their pops conductor.

I'm going for a masters in conducting....

I'll post another to this thread in a few years....

We'll see.....hehehehe

A couple come to mind:

Ken Singleton (Univ of North Co)
Douglas Bostock (Tokyo Kosei)

Walter Hilgers (tuba player with German Brass) is also a conductor in Germany.

Vince

Orcenith Smith was the conductor of the Chicago Youth Symphony, as well as the Orchestra conductor at Depauw University. He put me through the wringer at my audition with a bunch of excerpts I didn't know at the time. He was a great influence to me.

Chris Hall,
METopera Orch.