US orchestra names YSM student assistant conductor
In July, Samuel Hollister ’18, ’28DMA, was named assistant conductor of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, one of the most revered ensembles of its kind in the United States. Hollister’s chief responsibility will be to assist the orchestra’s music director, Stéphane Denève, and various acclaimed guest conductors. Hollister will also serve as the Fred M. Saigh Youth Orchestra Music Director of the St. Louis Symphony Youth Orchestra. Hollister met SLSO conductor laureate Leonard Slatkin in January 2023, when Slatkin conducted the Yale Philharmonia.
“[Slatkin] generously asked me to conduct some of the dress rehearsal of Bartok’s Concerto for Orchestra, so that he both could listen to the acoustics in Woolsey Hall and see me work,” Hollister said. “After that, he was very eager to help me however he could, and I’m so grateful to him for making the first connection between me and SLSO.”
“During his audition with the orchestra,” Denève said in an SLSO press release, “Samuel showed a very sophisticated and mature understanding of the symphonic repertoire, a vivid imagination, and inspiring musicality.”
The night before his SLSO audition, Hollister spoke with Yale Philharmonia principal conductor Peter Oundjian, who spent time, Hollister said, “reminding me of what I am already confident in, what aspects of my musical self are important to bring forward, and how to stay in control in the face of nerves.”
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