Superconductor interviews Jacques Lacombe

Superconductor chats with NJSO Music Director Jacques Lacombe about his work with the Orchestra in six venues across the state, the "Sounds of Shakespeare" Winter Festival, the NJSO's upcoming CD release of Verdi's Requiem and more:

Jacques Lacombe is always in motion. The energetic French Canadian conductor is in his penultimate year leading the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra, the Garden State's most significant professional ensemble in a bold season that ranges from rare works by New Jersey-born composers to a deep exploration of Shakespeare as an inspiration for 20th century composers. The orchestra is also getting ready to release a new recording to join its thunderous Carmina Burana. Things are looking up.

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How would you describe the sound of the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra?
J.L. :I would describe it as warm, deep and...what is the word...flexible.

Tell us some more about the Shakespeare Festival?
J.L. : This year and the next year is the celebration of Shakespeare's birth and in terms of inspiration from literature the list of plays and poems by Shakespeare and poems is endless. There are many different layers of his work. I decided to use that as the means for this season and next season to use that time of the year (the orchestra's January festival) to explore different ways of presenting music and different art forms.

For example, we are doing Romeo and Juliet with the Shakespeare Theater of New Jersey and the music of Prokofiev. Sometimes you will have the music and the music playing under some of the text, at other times you may just have the text. This is our second collaboration--our first was Sibelius' The Tempest.

We're going to have Sarah Chang in residence also, playing the West Side Story suite. There will be interaction with kids and the music schools and we are also trying to include lesser know n works: the Tchaikovsky Romeo and Juliet again with the tenor and the soprano, Falstaff by Elgar, and Korngold's (incidental music from) Much Ado About Nothing.

Read the full interview.

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