San Antonio Symphony News and Archive

Symphony director looks to leave




From the San Antonio Express News 7/2/99

By Mike Greenberg



San Antonio Symphony music director Christopher Wilkins announced Thursday that he will close a decade-long tenure at the orchestra's helm in 2001.

Wilkins, 42, has signed a new three-year contract under which he continues as music director through the 2000-01 season. He would become "music adviser" with limited duties in the 2001-02 season, his final year with the orchestra.

"Nothing will change with my responsibilities in the next two years, other than helping guide the process of transition," Wilkins said by phone from Colorado Springs. " I don't intend to be a lame duck."

He does, however, plan to peruse the want ads.

Wilkins said he had taken himself out of the running for other podiums until last spring, when he entered the race to succeed Raymond Leppard at the Indianapolis Symphony.

Searches are also under way in Cincinnati, Atlanta, Houston, St. Paul, Minneapolis and Boston, Wilkins' home town.

His recent guest conduting showcases have included the orchestras of Chicago, Houston, Indianapolis, Cincinnati, and Pittsburgh.

Symphony chairman Charles Lutz said a committee of musicians, current and former board members and community representatives will be assembled soon to search for a successor.

Candidates for the job will be scheduled as guest conductors in the 2000-01 and 2001-02 seasons, though guests already scheduled for this coming season may also become candidates, Lutz said.

Both Lutz and incoming chairman Kenny Wilson said San Antonio had been "spoiled" - in the positive sense - by Wilkins and that an ideal sucessor would share his abilities as a musicians and educator.

Principal oboist Mark Ackerman, a 24-year veteran with the orchestra, said Wilkins' collegial, democratic leadership style is "a rare and valuble thing. I think we would be fortunate to get (a successor) as kind and caring with the orchestra as he has been."

Moreover, Ackerman added, Wilkins "has achieved a kind of harmony with the orchestra and the community that I think has never happened here before."

That sentiment was echoed by Maria Elena Torralva-Alonso, executivedirector of the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center and a former chairwoman of the city's Cultural Arts Board.

"He has probably done more to reach out to the entire community, and especially the minority community, than any music director I can remember," Torralva said. "And he has been so well accepted because you can tell it's such a genuine gesture."

Wilkins embraced the culture to his adopted city to a degree that is rare among conductors of major orchestras.

He increased the programming of music by Mexican, Texan and Latin American composers, engaged three Mexican-American composers-in-residence with local roots and learned Spanish.

His efforts to seal a bond between the orchestra and its community also won national recognition.

Since 1994, Wilkins and the orchestra have won five consecutive awards for creative or contemporary programming from the American Society of Authors, Composers and Publishers.



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