Mr October
The urbane and windswept gypsy look is so de rigueur this season, I'm here to tell you. If you were in doubt...meet Greg, the ´óÏó´«Ã½ SSO's Mr. October... or as he's better known, Greg Lawson, our Principal Second Violin.
Greg is one of nine players who we've chosen to front this season's Glasgow campaign and represent the diverse personality of the orchestra. We'll be introducing them to you throughout the course of the season. He's quite a fellow, our Greg. He joined the orchestra earlier year as Principal Second Violin; he's the featured soloist in the folk-jazz-klezmer outfit Moshie's Bagel and he's an established and justly acclaimed soloist in his own right. We've not just chosen him, and our 8 other models, for his come-hither glance and the fact he takes a great photo. In this age of celebrity, it's far more effective to promote individuals as de facto ambassadors for our art rather than a large group.
The ´óÏó´«Ã½ SSO is (justly) acclaimed for its ensemble precision, described on the classical music blog as an orchestra that "plays together as a single instrument". But what is an orchestra but a collection of individuals. Most musicians in a large orchestra believe they're anonymous. But regular concert-goers know who the musicians are - by name if not by face. At every concert I get cornered by punters who comment directly about many the merits of our individual players, and I've yet to hear a negative remark. So if Lesley Garret is to opera what Charlie Dimmock is to Landscape Gardening, who represents the modern face of orchestral music? Charles Hazlewood? Sue Perkins? Goldie? I suggest that Ilan Volkov, Greg Lawson and the rest of the ´óÏó´«Ã½ SSO are pretty good advocates.
Next to the varied opinions we all have of the repertoire on the players' music stands, the media we use to promote the work of the orchestra are never going to be to everyone's taste. We would argue it's the subjectivity of the choices that makes it interesting, though, because for every player that we use to promote the work of the orchestra there are 75 others we could have chosen just as easily. By keeping them anonymous, we're merely doing them a disservice.
Stephen Duffy
Marketing Communications Manager, ´óÏó´«Ã½ SSO
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