Concert will celebrate 42 years of precocious playing

By Eric McHenry

As arts organizations go, the Greater Boston Youth Symphony Orchestras [GBYSO] isn't exactly youthful. Musicians who were high school seniors when the first orchestra was founded in 1958 will soon be seniors of another sort. A local institution housed from the beginning at Boston University's School for the Arts, GBYSO will celebrate its 42nd anniversary with a gala concert on March 12.

The current GBYSO musicians are similarly deceptive when it comes to their age. They play with a maturity that belies it. Last year, representatives of the Massachusetts Cultural Council ranked GBYSO first out of 45 applicants for support and characterized it as "indistinguishable from an adult orchestra." Three years prior, National Public Radio had identified GBYSO as one of the five best youth symphony orchestras in the country.

Federico Cortese Photo by Michael Lutch

"It's an orchestra that prepares kids to go into conservatories," says cellist Andrea Erdekian of Weston, a high school senior who has been with GBYSO since the sixth grade. "The rehearsals are strict -- three hours long, with a 15-minute break. There's no goofing around. I mean, people make jokes, but there's no real social time during rehearsal. It really prepares you for continued, serious study."

Erdekian's 22-year-old sister, Alyce, is a case in point. A GBYSO alumna with a degree in biology from Dartmouth, Alyce now plays with the Longwood Symphony.

"These are brilliant, talented kids," says Janet Underhill, chamber music coordinator for GBYSO. "Working with these gifted kids, seeing the way they respond to hearing themselves create some of the world's great music for the first time, is very enriching, very satisfying."

A group of BU community members led by Robert Choate, who was then director of the SFA music division, founded GBYSO in 1958 as a single orchestra for junior and senior high school musicians from the Boston area. Under the direction of faculty member Marvin Rabin it grew quickly in both size and reputation, performing at Carnegie Hall and the White House. In the early 1960s, it split into distinct senior and repertory orchestras to accommodate the many applicants.

Today, GBYSO's programs include a junior repertory orchestra for middle school students, a preparatory string orchestra for elementary school students, a senior chamber orchestra, and numerous chamber ensembles. GBYSO also sponsors a program that sends instructors into Boston-area independent schools, where they teach music performance as part of the day or after-school curriculum, and an intensive community program that helps prepare minority students from Roxbury, Dorchester, and Mattapan to play in the repertory and senior orchestras.

GBYSO senior orchestra cellists include, from front to back, Melvin Huang of Phillips Academy, Andover, Leah Johnson of Hanover High School, and Andrea Erdekian of Weston High School. Photo by Michael Lutch

Although it is prestigious and selective, Underhill says, GBYSO is not remote.

"There's a real interest in how the arts, music in particular, fit into the life of the individual and the life of the community," she says. "GBYSO really encourages students to participate in their school music programs. If there's a conflict, it's our stated policy that the school event takes precedence over GBYSO."

Led by Federico Cortese, assistant conductor for the Boston Symphony Orchestra and GBYSO's newly appointed music director, the senior orchestra will perform Berlioz's Symphonie Fantastique and Beethoven's Symphony No. 5 at the March 12 gala.

"Beethoven's Fifth is possibly the best-known piece of classical music," Erdekian says. "It's actually kind of scary. Everyone's going to know it, so we can't mess up."

The repertory orchestra will open the concert with a world premiere performance of Rondo Concertante by Noam Elkies, a mathematics professor at Harvard University. Elki