Sunday, August 10, 2025
7:00 PM
Following his highly acclaimed Tanglewood debut last summer, BSO Assistant Conductor Samy Rachid leads an exciting program featuring the American premiere of French composer Camille Pépin’s Un Monde nouveau, Mendelssohn’s Scottish Symphony, and Saint-Saëns’s Cello Concerto No. 1 with Yo-Yo Ma. It will be the first time that Ma performs this cello concerto at Tanglewood, the piece he performed with the Boston Pops in his 1971 Symphony Hall debut as a 15-year-old prodigy.
Samy Rachid, conductor
Yo-Yo Ma, cello
Camille PÉPIN Un Monde nouveau (American premiere)
Camille SAINT-SÄENS Cello Concerto No. 1
Felix MENDELSSOHN Symphony No. 3, Scottish
Also on this broadcast:
SHOSTAKOVICH Festive Overture (arr. Martin)
brass musicians of the Tanglewood Music Center
recorded on June 29 at Seiji Ozawa Hall
For more information on Tanglewood concerts, visit the BSO box office.
To hear a preview of the program with conductor Samy Rachid, use the player below, and read the transcript underneath.
TRANSCRIPT:
Brian McCreath I'm Brian McCreath at the Koussevitsky Music Shed with Samy Rachid, the Assistant Conductor for the Boston Symphony. Samy, thanks for a little bit of your time today. I appreciate it.
Samy Rachid Thank you so much for you taking the time. I know it's a busy festival for you, covering everything. It's a huge job! Thank you.
Brian McCreath Well, it's a busy time for every single person who does Tanglewood, right? We're all kind of working around the clock, but it's really, really fun. And this program that you have is so engaging. There's so much great stuff in this program, so let's talk about it a little bit. I wonder, first of all, whether this piece by Camille Pépin is a piece that you knew already or... Tell me how you came in contact with her music.
Samy Rachid Well, I've conducted that exact piece already this season in Europe, and I was very much looking forward to playing her music here because when we chose to do the Saint-Saëns Cello Concerto with the Mendelssohn [Third Symphony] in the second half, I thought, okay, it's not very close in terms of style, so we need something French to open it. And I know the administration here wanted something new, not like a concert overture or something like that. So I thought about this piece, which is maybe a bit too short for its quality. We want more of it. It's so beautiful. And in the end, when all the program was decided, we realized that there's actually a big line with everything, because all these three pieces are talking about one thing: nature. The Pépin is about climate change, the Saint-Saëns was inspired by Beethoven's storm in the Pastoral Symphony, the Mendelssohn "Scottish" Symphony is about everything in the landscape, and we even have a storm in it too. So in the end, it looks like an odd program, but there is a big link between these three pieces which was absolutely by chance. Sometimes it happens, you know? [Rachid chuckles]
Brian McCreath That's great! And to say that Camille's piece is about climate change doesn't indicate that it's scary in any way. It's actually, as you say, a very beautiful piece of music.
Samy Rachid A very beautiful piece, and it's a piece about hope that in the end, we can make it. I know it's always a touchy subject especially in the States, but I think if we all go in the right direction, we can do it—all of us together. So it's a piece full of hope, it's a piece about hope.
Brian McCreath I like that, yeah. Totally. You just said that the Saint-Saëns has a connection to Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony. Can you tell me a little bit more about that? That's not something that I was really aware of before you said it.
Samy Rachid So I was doing my research about the piece to understand the background of it, and I found on YouTube this masterclass from Pablo Casals on the Saint-Saëns Cello Concerto. And he's saying to one of his students that Saint-Saëns told him—because the young Pablo Casals knew Camille Saint-Saëns—that the inspiration of this concerto came to him from the fourth movement of the Pastoral Symphony, the storm. And all of this concerto is about nature like the tempest: the wind, the lightning, the trees falling apart and everything. It's a piece full of passion. And I know this piece is often performed in a more contemplative way and many people think of it as a bit of a competition concerto or a studio concerto. It's a bit underrated and I think it's a big mistake, because when you play this music with the meaning Saint-Saëns wanted to give it—and that's what we try to do—suddenly it becomes this unbelievable strength through the music, and people are on the edge of their seats because it's non-stop and it's very short. It's 18 minutes. And by the end of it [Rachid gasps] it's like a roller coaster, your hair are completely turned away and everything. So that's what we tried to do and I hope tomorrow we will succeed.
Brian McCreath I noticed in rehearsal even that you said to the horns, "This is lightning," and immediately the sound changed. That was a really lovely moment.
Samy Rachid Exactly. You just have to identify in the score what can help you. And the only brass we have are the horns, so they need to really go for it to give us the metallic sound that we need when we have very fast and sharp lightning.
Brian McCreath Now, you're a cellist yourself. Originally that was your career and then you switched over to conducting, and so I wonder what you felt when you found that Yo-Yo Ma would be your soloist in this program.
Samy Rachid I couldn't believe it. And until today, which was our first rehearsal, you know... When you're on the podium and you turn your head and he's like 15 centimeters from you, it's just incredible. Some people are like that, you know? It's like last season when I conducted the Kevin Puts with Renée Fleming, and sometimes you need to pinch yourself on the podium like, "Oh my god. This is happening." It's the beauty of Tanglewood. It's only here that these things can happen. It's a magical place.
Brian McCreath You just mentioned to me as we were settling in here, that Mendelssohn provides a particular kind of challenge—I think you said kind of all of his symphonies do. The "Scottish" Symphony has a really, really lovely character, so much darkness about it, but beautiful darkness to it. Tell me what it is about Mendelsson that is a little bit different from other music that you might conduct.
Samy Rachid Well, it's a very complex repertoire because you need to find, of course, beauty, legato, but also lightness, speed of the bow, speed of the détaché, of the winds. And it's full of passion, this music. He was always very sharp. So to succeed in having all of this, it requires from the conductor and from the players such a physical engagement, because it's very complex and delicate music. And like everything which is delicate, it's always difficult to succeed in it. So I was telling you before that when you see a Mendelssohn symphony in your calendar, you think, okay, it's going to be a very nice moment when I can—not relax, but you know, it's not like a Mahler symphony. And when you start to rehearse it, you realize how physical you need to be to succeed, to have the lightness that it requires. And it's a bit of a paradox between what you need to give to hear something different. That's something very specific about this music, and I'm sure all our listeners who have played [Mendelssohn's] chamber music, for example, or who have been in an orchestra playing this music, they will understand what I'm saying.
Brian McCreath But it's not just a question of rhythm. Lots of composers build rhythm. But it's also not just the question of phrasing. It's a combination of these things. It's the particular character of Mendelssohn's phrasing.
Samy Rachid Exactly, yes. Because you need to always have a steady tempo, but with a light spirit. And when you think about steady tempo, suddenly you feel that you need to be in the ground [Rachid does a low growl]. But no, you need to always be sparkling. It's champagne, you know? Not prosecco. Champagne. [Rachid and McCreath both laugh]
Brian McCreath That's great. Well, you just referenced a minute ago conducting Kevin Puts with Renée Fleming, and that is a great story, because you were not expecting to conduct that night—
Samy Rachid I wasn't saying that for that, for this reason—
No, no, no. Actually, I only mention it because you kind of triggered something I wanted to ask you anyway. So you had this moment at Symphony Hall when you had to literally step in in the middle of a concert to take over as the conductor, one of the many reasons that there's an assistant conductor standing by. Suddenly the conductor couldn't continue, it was now on to you. Also, I want to bring in that moment that I just mentioned where you asked the horns to play like lightning. Tell me about the time that you've had now with the Boston Symphony, especially because, as we discussed last year, the first recording of "Symphonie fantastique"—
Samy Rachid Oh, yes! [Rachid laughs]
Brian McCreath Right? The BSO has been with you for decades, it's been within you for this long. But now that you've worked with this orchestra, what is it that this orchestra has taught you, given you, that maybe other orchestras couldn't?
Samy Rachid Everything. Everything, because when you are in the early days of your career, the chances that you have access to that level of orchestra... It doesn't exist. No, it simply doesn't. And most of the assistant positions in the world, when they give you the opportunity to conduct the orchestra, it's always in a specific concert like a school concert or a prelude concert or something like that. It's rarely what the BSO has done with this position, giving you the real opportunity to conduct great repertoire with the orchestra. This is an experience that you can have only here. So for a young conductor, you learn everything. Because of course, this is the goal, to one day conduct as a guest. I mean, I'm sure all the young conductors would dream to conduct either here or the other great orchestras in the world. You learn so much about where to let them play, where... Simply, when are we really necessary as conductors? Because when you're young, you think that you are always necessary. And in the end, it's a question of, where can I help? And where can I shape the sound? Where can I have an influence on the way they play? And this is, I think, the most important thing I've learned and I'm still learning here.
Brian McCreath That is so beautifully said, [Rachid laughs] thank you for that. No, I love it, that's really wonderful! Because you're right, a great orchestra like this doesn't actually need to be guided every tiny second.
Samy Rachid They don't need anyone. [McCreath chuckles] No, honestly, you can just give the first upbeat and you joining them on the last chord. It's absolutely possible. But what they want and what they need is first—I hope—inspiration, and then just to help in some places when it's difficult to be together, because sometimes from the trumpets to the last row of the first violin it's difficult to hear each other. So this is where we enter, and this is what I try to do here. And I'm also learning from the best, because Andris Nelsons is just all about that, about finding where he can be useful and an inspiration. I think in the end, this is the most important thing. But it's the most difficult thing. [Rachid and McCreath both laugh]
Brian McCreath That's very fair. Samy, it's always great to talk with you. Thank you. I'm really looking forward to the program. Thanks a lot.
Samy Rachid Thank you so much. Thank you everyone.