20 years of the SBS Youth Orchestra – where music careers are nurtured
Mike Smith talks to Matthew Krel and Elena Kats-Chernin about their artistic collaboration for the orchestra’s anniversary concert
The SBS Youth Orchestra turns 20 this year. Founding conductor and artistic director, Matthew Krel, originally proposed the idea of an anniversary concert with composer Elena Kats-Chernin. ‘We worked together about 20 years ago,’ says Kats-Chernin, ‘and immediately we understood each other on a musical level. We were both Russian migrants, we had a lot in common. We lost touch for years while I was in Germany, then when I came back to Sydney for a visit we caught up again, and I found out about his project with the SBS Youth Orchestra. I really admire Krel, he’s so well suited to working with young people – he’s a great musician, always very direct and clear in his communications. The young players are so very fortunate to have him as their mentor. He allows them the opportunity to experiment and grow and values them as musicians in their own right. He’s inspirational.’
On 18 May they’re holding a very special concert to commemorate this anniversary, and alongside the music of Wagner, Respighi and Prokofiev will be a performance of the multi-award-winning Wild Swans suite by Elena Kats-Chernin. A movement from this piece, Eliza Aria, exploded onto the UK music scene when it was used for a TV advertisement for the British bank Lloyds–TSB, and then went on to reach the top of the classic iTunes chart.
Krel grew up in Russia in the 1960s and had a lot of personal contact with the composer Dmitri Kabalesky, who was dedicated to the idea of creating quality musical performance ensembles for young people. When Krel came to Australia he followed Kabalevsky’s lead, and was determined to form a youth orchestra of his own. In 1988 SBS management gave Krel the opportunity he sought – he could have ‘his’ orchestra, but it was up to him to make it work. Virtually no funds were available to the non-profit orchestra, and neither state nor federal governments would support them financially. It was a matter of dedication, boundless enthusiasm and sheer hard work.
Most of the Youth Orchestra concerts are televised and they have made over 70 television documentaries for SBS. Krel looks after everything, from creating the musical material itself to coming up with ideas for every documentary film. Of course, SBS must be happy with the final product. ‘The SBS Youth Orchestra is unique in the world,’ says Krel. ‘In order to secure the success of the venture, I knew they needed to have coverage on radio and television, rather than just a series of one-off concerts. This would mean access to a much wider audience. But the problem, of course, is finding a way to make television programs about music attractive to watch. Television audiences are very fickle and will head for the remote and change channels unless it’s genuinely entertaining.’... To read the full story become a friend of 2MBS-FM.
The SBS Youth Orchestra 20th Anniversary Concert is on Sunday 18 May at 2.30pm in the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, Macquarie Street, Sydney. Tickets are $25 for adults, $20 for concessions and $80 for family. For bookings, please call 9430 3979.