Artistic Staff
Music Director Steve Lipsitt
Steven Lipsitt is in his twelfth season as Music Director of the Boston Classical Orchestra. The Boston Globe has observed: “The concerts have a distinct profile, Lipsitt’s and no one else’s. He has a knack.”
First Prize Laureate of the inaugural Dimitris Mitropoulos International Conducting Competition in November 1996, Steven Lipsitt made his Russian debut with the St. Petersburg Philharmonic in 1997, and is a frequent guest conductor of orchestras in the United States and abroad, including the Athens Camerata, the West Czech Symphonic Orchestra, the State Symphony Orchestra of São Paulo (Brasil), the Thunder Bay Symphony Orchestra (Canada), the St. Petersburg Camerata of the Hermitage Museum, the Chinese National Opera Orchestra, the Colorado Symphony, the North Carolina Symphony, the San Diego Chamber Orchestra, the Spokane Symphony Orchestra, and the Hudson Valley Philharmonic. He has served as cover conductor for the symphony orchestras of St. Louis, Toronto, and Boston. Foreign critics have hailed his “exalted and well-structured performances” (Le Monde de la Musique, Paris) and praised his “technically and expressively balanced interpretations” (Adesmeftos Typos, Athens).
As a conductor of opera, ballet, and music theater, Steven Lipsitt has collaborated with Scottish Opera, Boston Lyric Opera, English National Opera, Boston Ballet, Saint Louis Ballet, the Boston Music Theater Project, the Boston Conservatory Opera Theatre, and Opera at Longy. He has worked with directors Robert Carsen, James Hammerstein, and Gerald Gutierrez, and choreographers Peter Martins and Daniel Pelzig. He conducted twenty performances of Carousel at the Kennedy Center Opera House with Broadway stars Faith Prince and Tom Wopat. His concert performance of scenes from Boris Godunov was called “an astonishingly vivid account” by The Globe’s Richard Buell, who wrote: “Steven Lipsitt’s conducting showed real mastery.” In 1994 his production of Viktor Ullmann’s Der Kaiser von Atlantis was called “compelling” by The New York Times, while The Globe’s Richard Dyer observed: “a razor-sharp intelligence was balanced by a generosity of spirit…Steven Lipsitt conducted with an unusual degree of skill and caring.” Dyer named this production Boston’s “Best Opera of 1994″ (tied with Robert Spano’s Rigoletto at Boston Lyric Opera).
Also dedicated to the training of young musicians, Steven Lipsitt has served on the conducting faculties of the Tanglewood Institute, New England Conservatory, the Hartt School of Music, Boston Conservatory, and Boston University, and has prepared student orchestras for Kurt Masur, Christoph von Dohnányi, Leon Kirchner, Luciano Berio, Stanislaw Skrowaczewski, Sergiu Comissiona, and Gunther Schuller. He holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Yale University, where he was the recipient of awards for exceptional promise and excellence in conducting. His principal conducting studies were with Otto-Werner Mueller at Yale, and in master classes with Herbert Blomstedt, Helmuth Rilling, Charles Bruck at the Pierre Monteux School, and Gustav Meier at Tanglewood. His earlier training included clarinet studies with Boston Symphony Orchestra member Pasquale Cardillo and Yale’s Keith Wilson, vocal studies with Joan Heller and Phyllis Curtin, and composition studies with Martin Bresnick and Jacob Druckman.
Harry Ellis Dickson, Music Director Laureate
Harry Ellis Dickson was appointed Music Director of the Boston Classical Orchestra in 1983 and Music Director Laureate in 1999. He served as Associate Conductor Laureate of the Boston Pops and the Founder and Conductor Laureate of the Boston Symphony Youth Concerts until his death in March 2003.
A native of Cambridge, Mr. Dickson was a graduate of Somerville High School and the New England Conservatory of Music. He joined the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 1938 under Serge Koussevitsky, was named Assistant Conductor of the Pops in 1958 and Associate Conductor in 1980. He founded the Boston Symphony’s current Youth Concert series in 1959.
The distinguished recipient of numerous awards, Mr. Dickson was honored by the City of Somerville in 1976, when the Harry Ellis Dickson Center of Fine Arts and Humanities was dedicated in its Winter Hill Community School. In 1983, the Boston Public Schools honored him by dedicating the Harry Ellis Dickson Orchestral Suite at Madison Park High School. In 1991, the City of Boston, in collaboration with the Boston Fenway Group and the Boston Redevelopment Authority, dedicated the Harry Ellis Dickson Park on Westland Avenue near Symphony Hall.
An ardent collector of anecdotes about music and musicians, Mr. Dickson incorporated many of them into his books, Gentlemen, More Dolce Please, Arthur Fiedler and the Boston Pops, and Beating Time.
In March 2003, Harry Ellis Dickson died at the age of 94.
Steven Lipsitt Remembers Harry Ellis Dickson
The Boston Classical Orchestra was privileged to have a special relationship with Harry Ellis Dickson these past twenty years, having benefited from his service as music director from 1983-1999 and as music director laureate subsequently. Although he did not found the orchestra, he did build it: under Harry’s guidance the BCO grew from playing three single programs annually to offering five programs, each played twice; he initiated our youth and outreach programs; he attracted soloists of the highest artistic level; and he established the precedent of offering occasional neo-classical works and lesser-known Classical compositions alongside the most beloved and popular music of Mozart, Haydn, Beethoven, and their contemporaries.
Most importantly and characteristically, Harry crafted a model for the BCO’s Faneuil Hall concerts which remains intact today: great music for chamber orchestra, played well by the city’s finest professional freelance musicians, offered honestly and unpretentiously, introduced from the podium with wit and affection.
Harry’s 65-year musical career in Boston certainly brought him before an enormous and diverse public — his work at Symphony Hall especially exposed thousands of concertgoers, young and old, to the palpable joys of live orchestral music. But nobody felt closer to him than his Boston Classical Orchestra audiences at Faneuil Hall: the intimacy of the space, Harry’s energetic presence and winning manner, the experience of hearing a Boston legend doing his best work inside a Boston landmark — these were treasurable events, and they made Harry’s audience feel that they knew him, and he knew them.
We honor Harry every time we play. He is irreplaceable, and we miss him.
Concertmaster Sandra Stecher Kott
Violinist Sandra Stecher Kott was named concertmaster of the Boston Classical Orchestra in 1997. She is an active orchestral and chamber musician performing with the Boston Pops Esplanade Orchestra, the Cantata Singers and the Arriaga String Quartet. She is also concertmaster of the Boston Lyric Opera Company and has previously served as concertmaster with the Opera Company of Boston under Sarah Caldwell.
Ms. Kott holds masters degrees in violin and music theory from the New England Conservatory of Music and is an Assistant Professor at the Berklee College of Music and chair of the string faculty at the Rivers Music School in Weston. She can be heard nationwide as the violinist in the theme music for the PBS series Victory Garden.
The Musicians of Boston Classical Orchestra
The Boston Classical Orchestra draws its musicians from the extraordinary community of professional freelance instrumentalists in the Greater Boston area. When not playing with Boston Classical, these men and women can be found performing with Boston Lyric Opera, Boston Ballet, the Boston Pops Esplanade Orchestra, the Rhode Island Philharmonic, Emmanuel Music, and various chamber ensembles, as well as teaching music students at New England Conservatory, Boston Conservatory, Berklee College of Music, the Longy School of Music, and the Rivers Music School.
Pre-concert Lecturer Mary Ann Nichols
Mary Ann’s’ interest in the arts began as a viola player in grade school. She studied theatre and played music through college and graduate school. She began her broadcasting career at classical station WGMS in Washington D.C. in 1981. From 1984-1996, she was announcer and music programmer for Boston’s classical radio station, WCRB. She is currently a broadcaster at WBUR.
