Pacific Symphony May Share Director

The Pacific Symphony “more than likely” will be sharing its next music director with “at least one other orchestra,” according to Preston Stedman, the head of a search committee to replace founding music director Keith Clark.

Clark, who will leave at the end of the 1988-89 season, has been a full-time conductor since the orchestra was founded 10 years ago. But “the job is not really a full-time job for the average conductor who is an up-and-coming professional,” Stedman said.

“There are only nine pairs of classical concerts (on the orchestra’s schedule), and that’s hardly a season. So what’s he going to do, sit around and look at beach girls or something?

“(The new conductor) probably will not want to conduct pops concerts, and, I would think, he may not want to conduct a children’s concert. He may ; some (of the candidates) have expressed an interest in the children’s concerts. The next conductor may not want to do run-outs (concerts given at sites other than the Performing Arts Center), either. If he agreed to do all the concerts, then it’s a full-time job.” Clark performed all those functions.

Stedman, a professor of music at Cal State Fullerton since 1976, was one of the founders of Pacific Symphony and hired Clark as its conductor. Clark’s current contract was not renewed by the orchestra’s board.

Stedman said the orchestra “may work up a contract that pays the new conductor on a weekly basis, rather than on an annual basis.

“You get so much a week for doing whatever it is, plus you tack on other (pay) for being music director,” he said, noting that the music director’s increment would be “probably worth another 2-weeks’ salary.”

Stedman thinks a dual appointment would pose no problems in attracting first-rate talent. “That’s what (quality conductors) want,” he said. “You tie them down” otherwise.

The orchestra would not require the new conductor to maintain full-time residency in the county, Stedman added. “We’d appreciate it, but we can’t say that that is going to be crucial.”

Nonetheless, Stedman said, the orchestra will expect the new conductor “to participate in some way” in the community so as to be “able to assess the environment and to begin to study ways for the orchestra to have a much broader base in that environment--and that implies more than just coming here to conduct.”

“So if he’s not prepared to do that, we’re not interested in him. Of course, most young guys love to do that. They dive right into it.”

Clark’s replacement is expected to be named in time for the 1990-91 season. Kazimierz Kord of the Warsaw Philharmonic has been named principal guest conductor and music adviser for the 1989-90 season.

Stedman said the search committee has pared about 250 applicants down to about 10.

“Surprisingly few women applied,” he said. “We expected more than we got.” He said he doesn’t think any women are among the finalists.