Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, May 13, 1994 TAG: 9405130116
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By JEFF DEBELL STAFF WRITER NOTE: Strip
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Victoria Bond, the Juilliard-trained conductor who put the Roanoke Symphony Orchestra on the musical map, will leave it after the 1994-95 season.
She said she wants to devote more time to guest conducting and to composing music of her own.
"This was the moment," Bond said Thursday during a break in rehearsals for "The Marriage of Figaro." "It was a question of looking down the road."
Instead of negotiating a new three-year contract, she asked for a one-year pact and informed the Roanoke Symphony Society of her intention to leave after fulfilling it.
"The Marriage of Figaro" is an upcoming production of Opera Roanoke, for which Bond serves as artistic director in addition to her position with the orchestra. She is committed to the opera company's 1994-95 season, as well as the orchestra's.
"We consider ourselves lucky she's stayed as long as she has," said Heidi Krisch, president of the Symphony Society. "She has brought the orchestra to a level that is unbelievable. We're all rooting for her to go on to bigger and better things."
Bond, 49, is a native of Los Angeles. She graduated from the University of Southern California in 1968, and in 1977 she became the first woman to win a doctorate in conducting from New York's prestigious Juilliard School of Music. She spent two years as a conducting assistant to Andre Previn at the Pittsburgh Symphony and was conductor and music director of the Albany-based Empire State Youth Orchestra before coming to Roanoke in 1986.
Bond was among some 250 applicants to become the first full-time conductor in the Roanoke Symphony Orchestra's history. Heiress and arts patron Marion Via, who has since died, provided funds to underwrite the position for 10 years.
Bond and three other finalists came to the valley for interviews and a "conduct-off" at William Byrd High School one May morning in 1986, and Bond ended up with the job. Since then, she has maintained homes both in Roanoke and in New York, where her husband of 20 years, Stephan Peskin, is a trial lawyer.
Then-Symphony Society president Thomas D. Rutherfoord said he wanted to make a sensation with the new conductor, and he knew hiring a woman "would put Roanoke on the map."
"I came on faith and a prayer," Bond recalled. "I was told it was a situation full of potential. But it was a shot in the dark whether the community was going to like my ideas."
Bond studied public radio station WVTF's playlist for its most popular classical pieces and has been careful to perform some of them in the orchestra's concerts. But she also worked more challenging music into the repertoire - the symphonies of Gustav Mahler, 20th century classical music, jazz - and has been pleased at the public's response. "Part of being a conductor is being a teacher," she said. "The musical sense of the audience has grown enormously."
Bond's arrival ushered in a period of unprecedented financial and artistic success for the orchestra. It began building a professional staff soon after Bond's arrival. The number of performances increased. Many of them were sold out. A summer pops series was instituted. The orchestra did concerts in Rocky Mount, Lexington, the New River Valley and other places.
The musicians' pay increased, along with the quality of their work. There were high visibility collaborations with Ray Charles, Billy Taylor and other luminaries. At the forefront of it all, whether conducting, raising funds or riding a float (once) in Roanoke's Christmas parade, was Victoria Bond.
"She had the ability to capture the imagination of the public at a time when it was important for that to happen," said violinist James Glazebrook, longtime concertmaster of the orchestra. He said it was largely because of Bond's role that the orchestra was able to get the support it needed in professionalizing its management, budgeting and leadership.
Glazebrook also praised the conductor for her community outreach programs, including unprecedented efforts to bring black people into the orchestra's audience and support activities.
Bond, for her part, gives credit to the Symphony Society.
"It's been extraordinary," she said. "Prudent, responsible, but flexible. Never patronizing. They never made me uncomfortable about being a woman in this position."
The orchestra's budget climbed from less than $200,000 in 1986 to more than $1 million by the early 1990s. Economic downturns have since forced cutbacks, including discontinuation of the pops series, though Bond says that was not a factor in her decision to leave.
Rather, it was the desire to pursue the "other directions" of composing and guest conducting. "Eight years is probably about the right amount of time," she said. "It's perfect to build something and to offer what I had to offer."
Bond has composed dozens of pieces of music, including a recent commission for the internationally known (and Blacksburg-based) Audubon Quartet. It will be performed by the quartet this summer at festivals in Pennsylvania and New York. Bond's opera, "Travels," a piece years in preparation, will be given its world premier next season by Opera Roanoke. It is based on Jonathan Swift's "Gulliver's Travels."
Judith Clark, Opera Roanoke's executive director, said Bond can take much of the credit for the company's growth from a volunteer organization "to a largely professional one that is nationally recognized as a regional opera. Our quality is remarkable for a company as small as this one is, and she's responsible as much as anyone."
Knowing that the Via grant would expire after 10 years, Krisch said, the Symphony Society has been conducting a "quiet endowment campaign" to assure continuation of a full-time professional conductor's position. She said more than $700,000 in cash and pledges have been raised toward a goal of $1 million, and the hope is that the full amount will be in place by the time a new conductor is hired.
"We have been preparing for this," Krisch said. The plan is to advertise the position nationally through the American Symphony Orchestra League and to winnow applicants down to a handful of finalists by summer 1995. Each finalist will be invited to conduct a concert during the orchestra's 1995-96 season, and one of them will be given the conductorship in time to take over for the 1996-97 season.
There will be no "infamous conduct-off" like that of 1986, Krisch said.
by CNB