Christopher Dragon flies back to WASO

In 2015, Perth-born Christopher Dragon took up a position as Associate Conductor with the Colorado Symphony. The appointment followed three years as Assistant Conductor with the West Australian Symphony Orchestra, where he worked closely with Principal Conductor Asher Fisch. Now 27, the “baby conductor” is also Principal Guest Conductor with the Denver Young Artists Orchestra.

A music graduate from the West Australian Academy of Performing Arts (WAAPA), Dragon played the clarinet in the WA Young Orchestra and began his conducting career in 2011 after winning the WA Youth Orchestra’s Woodside Concerto Competition. He was a member of the prestigious Symphony Services International Conductor Development Program under the guidance of course director Christopher Seaman, and has studied with numerous other distinguished conductors including Leonid Grin, Paavo and Neeme Järvi at the Järvi Summer Festival, Fabio Luisi at the Pacific Music Festival and conducting pedagogue Jorma Panula.

Dragon works regularly in Australia and has conducted the Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and West Australian Symphony Orchestras. In February, he conducted WASO’s 2018 season opener, WASO’s Favourites – a program of classical hits by Handel, Bizet, Gershwin and Orff, culminating in Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony. This Friday he conducts A Symphonic Tribute to Comic-Con for WASO featuring music from Game of Thrones, Star Wars, Dr Who, Final Fantasy, Star Trek and Jurassic Park – for which he may very well don a character suit. He spoke to Limelight.

How do you find it going back and forth between the Colorado Symphony and WASO?

It is great working with two orchestras that I am so close with. With WASO, a lot of the musicians I’ve basically grown up with, they knew me when I was studying clarinet at university. And Colorado, I’ve now been there long enough that again it’s like having another family. It’s nice being able to work with orchestras that you know so well, but I have to admit, the travel doesn’t get any easier, it’s horrible.

How was it conducting such familiar fare in the WASO Favourites concert, particularly something as well known as the Beethoven Five?

It’s a very daunting thing going to pieces like Beethoven Five. And especially more daunting knowing that I think the last time that WASO played it was with Asher, who is my closest mentor. So, having to come back to a piece like that, having known that they’ve done the whole cycle with Asher, is extremely daunting. And actually I was the assistant conductor at that stage when they were doing the Beethoven cycle, so I am very aware of how Asher’s done it, and all the things that he’s put in to the piece. But in the end, unfortunately I’m not Asher Fisch, so I can’t really do it in the same way that he’s done it. I just approach it in my own way, and really music’s always fresh every time that you hear it. To try and copy something doesn’t really work, you might as well put a CD on. It’s a piece I love, and I’ve conducted it a few times.

How important was the three years you had as Asher Fisch’s Assistant Conductor?

It’s had the biggest impact on my music career. It really made me change the way that I think about conducting and rehearsing. It was a great time for me to be at WASO when he joined because I saw the impact that a music director can actually make on an orchestra. There are just so many different levels and I really think WASO’s one of the best orchestras in Australia right now by far, and a lot of that has to do with Asher coming in and changing the way the orchestra works and plays together.

Have there been other conductors you’ve found particularly inspiring?

In terms of other kind of mentor conductors, I should say Christopher Seaman, who used to run the conductor program with the Symphony Services Australia. I was part of that program for quite a few years, so Christopher was one of my first mentors there, and he’s very, very different to Asher. But I think with every conductor that you meet, you take specific things from them, and then, of course, in Colorado, Andrew Litton was the Music Director when I joined there, so he’s also been super helpful and actually after the WASO concerts in February I flew straight to spend some time with him as I conducted The Red Violin in Colorado [in late February]. Since he had a lot to do with the premiere of it, I studied with him a little bit on that piece. Every conductor I’ve met so far has been extremely helpful.

You started out as a clarinettist?

Yes, my teacher was actually Allan Meyer, who’s the principal clarinet right now in the Symphony.

You studied at WAAPA. At what point did you think you might set your sights on conducting rather than playing?

Even from the first year of university I was interested in studying conducting. I started at UWA and then I finished my time at WAAPA, but neither of them really offered a core conductor unit. It was kind of an add-on, not something you studied properly. I’m not really sure what drew me to it because it wasn’t really something I had done before, but I was just very interested. I would always go to concerts and spend a lot of my just watching and being fixated on what the conductor was doing. And I guess also playing clarinet in orchestras, I think I found it a bit frustrating sometimes because the clarinet, you sit basically at the back of the orchestra, and when you hear something going wrong it’s not really your place to say anything. Everyone’s responsible for their own part, so I guess being a conductor I had more of an input to the overall process of music making. I think I started conducting when I was 20 or 21 at the beginning of university. That’s when I put my own orchestra together and I thought ‘why not give it a shot?’ If this works, it’s a great thing but if not, well, I’m back to playing clarinet.

What was your own orchestra?

At the time I put together, I think it was called the Swan Philharmonic and I kind of combined players from both universities, so UWA and WAAPA. So, I just got my friends together and we did concerts, and basically it didn’t go completely wrong, so from there it snowballed very quickly to here.

How did you hear about the opportunity at Colorado? 

I just saw it advertised online and I applied. I was just very lucky to get the job, because they were 209 applicants, and from the 209 I think they cut it down to either eight or 10, who they invited to conduct the orchestra for an audition process. It was really the most crazy audition process I’ve ever done, in that it went over three days. Usually these auditions happen just over a day or two, but this was three and each day you would get a call at the end of the day saying whether you’d made it for the next round or not. I think it started with 10 or eight, and it went down to six and then it went down to three.

Are you enjoying being there?

It’s great, I’ve gotten to do so many different kinds of concerts there and my schedule is just packed. I’m really keen to be exposed to the working life of a conductor, having to do a different concert basically every week. There’s non-stop music, my life is always studying now.

You’re obviously very game – I have seen footage of you conducting the Orchestra playing the theme from Jurassic Park at Comic Con dressed as a T-Rex. Could you move at all in the costume?

It’s a huge suit. It’s actually inflated, there’s a fan inside that inflates it, but as you see, the T-Rex has tiny arms which is hilarious, so being inside the suit, the only part of my arms I could use was my wrists, so that’s kind of a good thing technique-wise. But it was fun! I love doing stuff like that, I think music doesn’t have to be taken so seriously all the time. I think people can have fun with it. I didn’t tell the musicians of the orchestra that I was wearing this costume, so I came onstage during the concert, I think most of them couldn’t even play because they were just laughing because they had no idea this was going to be happen. So, I like keeping them on their toes also by doing stuff like that.

Are you planning anything for the Comic-Con concert at WASO?

Absolutely, that’s all part of the show, not knowing what to expect.

Presumably a concert like this attracts a very different audience to the normal concert-going audience?

Of course it does and part of that is to do with the music that you’re playing. But I think also with that Comic-Con music, there is such a wide variety of music in it, everything from movies, superhero music, video game music, so there really is something for everyone, at least for the audience which maybe hasn’t been to a symphony before. I think they will find this a very comforting way to be exposed to it to a symphony orchestra and really show that it’s not a scary thing at all.

You also have a conducting position with the Denver Young Artists Orchestra. When did that start?

I started working with them last season. I also do a few things with the university. I think it’s really important to be working with the younger generation, being able to share what you’ve learnt as a conductor. The funny thing is I’m not actually much older than some of the people that are there, so it’s fun working with people more my own age. When I was in Perth I was heavily involved with the WA Youth Orchestra as a clarinettist and I played throughout all their different ensembles. The Youth Orchestra in Perth played such an important part of my musical growth that I feel like I need to give back to it wherever I am because I know how invaluable it is, and actually I come and work with the WAAPA orchestra basically every year I’m back. I think it’s been three or four years I’ve been doing that.

How old are you now?

I’m 27, I’m still a baby conductor. That’s how Asher puts it – “baby conductor”. It’s been crazy because despite my age I’ve been able to do so many things in a short amount of time. Apart from having jobs in WASO and getting this great gig in Colorado, and also being able to conduct already the Melbourne Symphony and Sydney Symphony with Josh Pyke, which won an ARIA, I’m working with artists like Wynton Marsalis and his Jazz at the Lincoln Center Orchestra. So, there’s been a lot of things that I still pinch myself I’ve been able to do.

Jo Litson on April 9, 2018 — Limelight Magazine