The Madison Symphony Orchestra Celebrate Its 100th Anniversary: A Century of Beautiful Music
Robert Reed is in his fourth season as the executive director of the Madison Symphony Orchestra
by Jonathan Gramling
The Madison Symphony Orchestra is in the midst of celebrating its 100 years of playing beautiful music in Madison. While everyone who has been in Madison for any length of time knows John DeMain, the artistic director — and conductor — of the symphony, the one in the background who keeps “the trains running on time” is Robert Reed, its executive director who is in his fourth season.
Reed is a former musician who took up arts administration.
“Both of my degrees are in clarinet performance from the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music,” Reed said. “I’ve had my time on stage. But I was smart enough to realize that the career that I wanted to have was not going to be fulfilled by being a playing musician. And so I learned of arts administration and from Day One of getting into arts administration, it has definitely felt like a calling. And I felt like I do more on this side than being a playing musician because I organize so many things for large groups of people. And I am doing more than just playing one part on the stage of a concert. I’m pretty happy with the choice and haven’t looked back once.”
But that doesn’t mean that Reed won’t pick up the clarinet someday and play for the pleasure of it.
“If I play with a small group, it is strictly for fun,” Reed said. “I haven’t done it in a few years. I have before of course. You realize that when you haven’t played in a while that you start losing the embouchure. You start losing some of the muscle memory. And sometimes it gets frustrating
because you’re thinking you can just pick up your instrument and it would be just like it used to be. You realize that you can’t. And so I keep saying to myself, ‘When I get closer to retirement, I will eventually start playing again just for fun for me.’ But my job keeps me so busy that when I get home, I keep going. So I haven’t had the time to just really play. But I will eventually.”
The MSO was formed in 1925. It’s population was approximately 48,000 people, not much larger — about 8,000 people — than the city of Sun Prairie is today. And yet somehow the orchestra came to life and the metropolitan area has been supporting it ever since.
“It was the Madison Civic Orchestra at that time,” Reed said. “It was definitely a community group. No one was paid. It was just an orchestra that performed. I believe the first concert was at Central High School in Madison. And so it went on for years. Fortunately over the years, it had the assistance of Madison College. They embraced the Madison Symphony Orchestra and actually the Madison Symphony became a part of Madison College for a period of time. And Madison College was very helpful in the area of financials of the organization and kept it afloat as an organization.”
There have been four artistic directors during the 100 year history: Sigfrid Prager, Walter Heermann, Roland Johnson and John DeMain. DeMain, arguably, has had the biggest impact on the orchestra.
“The Madison Symphony Orchestra transitioned to a professional paid symphony orchestra during John’s time,” Reed said. “That’s when people started to audition for the positions. It definitely became unionized. Over the years, there may have been people paid here and there. But when it came to fully professional — everyone getting paid — that was during John’s time. The organization has gone from a community group to a fully professional symphony orchestra, a Group Three Orchestra in the League of American Orchestras’ group directory. It’s a wonderful orchestra.”
And it attracts musicians from all over the country.
“We don’t just get players coming from Chicago,” Reed emphasized. “When we have an opening, we have musicians auditioning from California, Boston and other parts of the country. And they will come to Madison and move to Madison. We’re thrilled with what we are doing in our economy. We’re helping the community by bringing musicians here who end up living here. And it helps out when it comes to weddings and playing other gigs in town. And so we are just thrilled to be celebrating 100 years right now.”
There are two primary things that have allowed MSO to reach its current heights. The first is the Overture Center.
“We’re blessed to have such a vibrant facility to perform in, the Overture Center for the Arts,” Reed said. “Guest conductors will tell you that our hall here in Madison, Wisconsin will beat some of the orchestra halls in the top ten in the country in terms of budget size. We have halls that are the mini orchestras in big cities. It’s such a thrill that we get to play in such a wonderful facility.”
The second is the arts audience in Madison and Dane County.
“For a metropolitan area of 700,000, we have a high propensity of community members who want to have some sort of experience, whether it is a symphony, theater, or Broadway,” Reed said. “It makes us unique that we have an audience that is hungry for a good arts performance and experience. The Overture Center is an amazing hall. So we have a great orchestra for our size and we bat above our weight. We have now become the envy of orchestras. It’s just a great place to be, not just from the arts standpoint, but Madison is just a wonderful city to call home. People who are not from here think of Wisconsin as being cold. And when they get here and they realize the community we have here and how so many people are moving here and continue to move here. And what struck me was how many people from other places retire and they stay here. They just don’t go to Arizona, Texas or Florida. They stay here. I have four board members who all lived in Chicago and they retired and moved to Madison. And so that is just a great reputation. It has a good food scene, good everything. And so it all comes together to make one happy marriage.”
And UW-Madison — and other universities — also contribute to the ability of MSO to attract top-notch artists.
“UW-Madison period makes a huge difference in this community,” Reed said. “We’re a major college town. When you have 53,000-54,000 students who are in this area, the university is a huge driver in this community, not just from a tax revenue standpoint, but a driver for people coming here and staying here. The School of Music is a good school of music. We definitely have some musicians who play in the orchestra who also teach on the faculty, but not just at UW-Madison. We have some who teach at UW-Whitewater and other campuses. It’s always a good thing. Some of the students are able to interact with us and that is great. I think there is an opportunity for us to develop an even more of a strong partnership between the university and the Madison Symphony like we had with Madison College over the years. But I think there is some opportunity to develop more partnership with UW-Madison so that it is something that is solid and will attract more people to come here.”
What has kept MSO vital is that it has stayed relevant to the community during changing times while still retaining its values and qualities as a symphony orchestra.
“MSO is something that people should feel a sense of pride with,” Reed said. “We attract people. We attract businesses. We are something that people should have a great sense of pride in. I hope people feel it. If not, all I can say is come and experience it. And you will get to enjoy it. We have so many different things now that we didn’t have years ago when we were just a subscription orchestra doing classical concerts. Now you can come to movies. There are more educational things to experience. It doesn’t matter what your musical tastes are. Some people when they think of classical music, they think of something that is more elitist and not for them. But boy if you say Star Wars, they know the music of Star Wars. We want to make sure that people feel like there is something to come to and that everyone doesn’t have to feel like they are a musicologist to be able to enjoy the symphony.”
From Reed’s perspective, MSO is in a good place to reach even higher heights in the next 100 years.
“We’ve gone through many ups and we’ve gone through many downs,” Reed observed. “And we definitely feel that we are in an upswing right now. There are so many good things happening. The organization is financially sound. And so we are looking forward to our next 100 years because we will be celebrating with a new music director in the near future. And so as John has brought the orchestra to where it is today, we are looking forward to the next person taking the orchestra to its next plateau.”
Reed does have some thoughts on what reaching that next plateau could involve.
“In 100 years, I hope that MSO will be even stronger than it is now,” Reed said. “Hopefully it will be very established and in the upper echelon of symphony orchestras. Hopefully there will be a sense of great pride within the community, that it’s just not another orchestra, but that it is one of the top orchestras. Hopefully it will be there and we will continue to surprise people for a city of our size to have an orchestra that has grown to this magnitude, that is doing many things. I would love for us to have a Grammy recording. I would love for us to be able to occasionally tour to Carnegie Hall and different places. Hopefully in the next 100 years, we’ll be able to do more of those tings. We’ll be able to go through the state of Wisconsin and perform more than just performing in Madison. There is so much that could be done.”
While Robert Reed won’t be here for the second 100 years of the Madison Symphony Orchestra, one gets the sense that he will remain involved as long as he is effective.
“I wish I would have known how wonderful it was here so that I would have come earlier,” Reed said.
Robert Reed has helped set the stage for a strong second 100 years. Forward!