A Conversation with Rachael



SHE LEADS, WE FOLLOW:
An Upbeat Chat with Rachael Worby
By Christina Hamlett

Is there a glass ceiling in the conducting business?
“Let me tell you something about that ceiling,” she reveals. “It’s actually ferro-cement and I’ve hit it a couple of times.” In a recent op-ed piece she penned following the Baltimore Symphony’s appointment of Marin Alsop, Worby commented, “One would think that in the business of conducting music, a female would be one of the least offensive intrusions into the perceived order of society. But no. The world of classical music is steeped in tradition and, like so many Tevyes, we cling to it with faces reddened and knuckles white. In Baltimore, the selection of Marin Alsop represents opportunity and a willingness to change, but fear not. Those of us in the microscopic world of ‘chicks with sticks’ didn’t get this far without having to be better and better and still better.”

She prophecies that time—and lots of it---is what it will take for more of her gender to be handed the baton of world class orchestras. “Twenty-five years ago, there weren’t any women as music directors. Today there are about 10. Maybe in the next 25 years that number will multiply, then multiply again in the following quarter century as more females step into traditionally male venues. In our lifetime,” she muses, “a woman will be president of the United States. Maybe in my daughter’s lifetime, the entire Supreme Court will be all female. One can only hope.”
You have such a passion for bringing music to young people and the disenfranchised.
Where does that come from?
“My parents—both of whom had and continue to have a social conscience—were inspired to stay very active in the world. No one in my family is a working musician but everybody in my family is very musical. My father plays piano and sings but doesn’t read music. My mother plays the piano and has perfect pitch. My brothers are musical. Both sets of my grandparents,” she explains, “were deeply involved in their local communities and were always concerned about issues such as human rights, women’s rights, civil rights and, through the powerful examples they set, I became concerned as well. They also appreciated the theater and visual arts, architecture and sculpture.” She smiles. “It would have been impossible to be raised in such an environment and not want to throw my arms around all of the arts and bring their beauty to as many people as possible.”
Who was the first person in music you admired?
“Leonard Bernstein is someone who led a life that I perceived was an equal balance between political commitment and social conscience and his musical genius.”
Bernstein, in fact, is the person she says she’d choose when I pose the question of which composer—living or dead—she’d most like to have lunch with. “It would be a long lunch in New York,” she fantasizes, “and we’d talk about politics and Ella Fitzgerald recordings and probably also about Thelonious Monk whose work he adored.”
How did it feel the first time you conducted a professional orchestra?
“Well, for one thing,” she reminisces, “I was old for a conductor when I conducted my first orchestra, largely because I hadn’t imagined that I could ever become one. I didn’t think I needed to have a role model or to be preceded by anybody else who looked like me in order to become a conductor. When I took up my baton and raised my arms for the first downbeat, it was a surrealistic and strange experience all at once because when one studies conducting as I did, one conducts to silence. One doesn’t put on recordings and wave one’s arms around in time to the music. My arms felt very heavy as the sounds I had previously only imagined in my head suddenly came to life.”
What is the essence of conducting?
The essence of conducting, she divulges, is in leading and being ahead of the music. “You don’t wait until you hear the music to show your beat. You show your beat and a nanosecond later the music flows. If you do it any other way, the music will start to go slower and slower.”
What do you listen to for fun and inspiration?
“I have very eclectic taste in music,” she replies. “I listen to world music. I like Cuban and Columbian. I have a fairly extensive jazz collection, too.” And then there’s music of Coldplay, Thelonious Monk, Moby, Beethoven, “and a Hard Day’s Night,” she adds to the list. “It’s rare that a day goes by when I’m not listening to some kind of music. There’s no real pattern to it—just whatever I’m in the mood for.”
What specific educational outreach do you do?
“When I took on the position as music director, it was with the understanding that the Board of Directors would be supportive of an extensive outreach program to infuse the entire community—and most especially its young people—with music.” To that end, she is deeply involved with Blair High School in Pasadena, John Adams Middle School in South Central L.A. (whose music program is funded by the L.A. Rotary Club), and The Sycamores, a residential treatment center for at-risk boys.
“This is a long term and intensive program where we’re seeing students 40-50 times a year for three years in a row.” It’s Worby’s intent—and that of the POPS Board—to double the number of outreach schools in the program and thereby increase the number of kids exposed to the benefits of a musical education.
“Our goal isn’t just about music appreciation, though,” she clarifies. “It’s about infusing the ability to be more disciplined and to build and rebuild ego and self esteem for our young people, many of whom have had too few—if any—opportunities to express themselves in a positive and enriching way.”
What impact does your work have on the children?
She references the psychological studies which show that those things which children touch and experience when they are 3, 4, and 5 settle them into patterns for life, patterns of knowing who they are and of knowing how to learn. “When those vital pieces are missing from a child’s early education, it’s my contention that, like a patchwork quilt, you can find a way to mend some of the broken seams.”
“The arts—but especially music—instill in young people capabilities that are not learnable in other disciplines, most especially the ability to be able to listen. That’s what music is about. It’s about using your ears—something which is challenging to all people, not just children. The art of hearing—hearing one another—entails listening, analyzing the information, synthesizing it and responding appropriately. Music is one of the few things in the world to which people can naturally respond.”
How can we further these programs?
“We need to align public schools with non-profit organizations and the corporate sector. At Blair, for instance, we received a three year grant from the Parsons Corporation, without which the program would not exist. As a result, we have 250 students who now have something in their lives I’m sure will remain the single most remarkable thing that ever happened to them.”
How do children react to your programs?
“My kids know they’re special because of the consistency of the program. Too many times I’ve seen programs that are essentially ‘drive-by education’ where you do something for one day and that’s it. What good does that really do? Every time I return to Blair, the kids’ mouths drop open in awe. They can’t believe that, true to my word, I’m already coming back when I was just there a few weeks ago.”
What she gets in return, she tells me, is priceless. “Once a young person gives you love, they give you trust. When they love you and they trust you, you can teach them anything. Without these programs, these kids would have an internal poverty that would be noticeable for the rest of their lives.”
“The more you give to young people,” she advises, “the more they give back to you. Being in the presence of young people inspires my own passion to communicate about life and love and music. Sadly, lots of adults are scared of young people because they don’t understand them or they think they’re pretty tough.” She grins. “The tougher and more difficult they are to reach, the more I gravitate toward them.”
How she’d want to be remembered a hundred years from now?
 "Music must be for everybody. The traditional symphony orchestras are concerned about attendance because they haven’t changed the form of their presentations. One cannot do this by combining wine with chamber music once a month. You need varied programs from the stage: Great music from the classical repertoire, superb Broadway, solo singers... mix Jimi Hendrix and Josef Haydn…discover great music and play it. I want people to say that I brought music to the world without being stuffy about it.”