To Orchestras that Hire Conductors of Color:

Stop tarring them as racial hires before they step on the podium

Yesterday, the Baltimore Symphony announced its selection of Jonathon Heyward as music director. At the age of 29, he became not only the first black music director of a top-10 American orchestra, but (to my knowledge) the second youngest top-10 music director ever, after Zubin Mehta.

The BSO at the Strathmore in Bethesda, MD (Photo credit, Craig James)

Here’s an outline of Heyward’s meteoric rise: He grew up a young cellist attending Charleston, South Carolina public schools, before pursuing conducting studies at Boston Conservatory. (He may be the first conductor from either South Carolina or Boston Conservatory to achieve wide renown). He first came to international notice by winning the 2015 Besançon Competition for young conductors in France, and since has served as guest and assistant conductor with several middleweight orchestras in Western Europe, before being appointed music director of the Nordwestdeutsche Philharmonie last year. While that orchestra is ranked about 20th in Germany, it does have the distinction of producing another young conducting phenom recently selected to helm a major American orchestra: Andris Nelsons, who led the orchestra from 2006 to 2009 before being named music director of the City of Birmingham Symphony in 2007 and then the Boston Symphony in 2013 at age 35.

Personally, I’ve never met Heyward or seen him conduct. I have no basis for saying that he isn’t the sort of world historical genius who would be worthy of stepping into the shoes of David Zinman, Yuri Temirkanov, and Marin Alsop at age 29, with a single year of professional orchestra music-directing under his belt. (Those BSO predecessors, mind you, were appointed at the ages of 49, 62, and 51, respectively). But if Heyward is that kind of genius, then the BSO has already done his career a great disservice—one that may prevent him from ever being considered a peer of his fellow major orchestra music directors.

Here is the passage from the orchestra’s press release announcing his appointment that did it (emphasis added): “Appointing Jonathon Heyward as music director is equally inspirational and aspirational. We are inspired by his artistry, passion, and vision for the BSO, as well as by what his appointment means for budding musicians who will see themselves better reflected in such a position of artistic prominence. At the same time, his is a star on the rise, and the heights we can achieve together are truly limitless.”

There may be nothing wrong with orchestra administrators privately celebrating the hire of a conductor of color on the grounds that he (or better yet, she) might inspire more young people to become musicians, and their parents to become orchestra subscribers. (I have my doubts as to whether playing racial identity politics helps orchestras at the box office, but if that’s feasible anywhere, it will be in Baltimore, a city that’s 70% nonwhite.) It may also be inevitable that such thinking will creep into the minds of conductor search committee members as they evaluate candidates.

But if those administrators cared at all about the wellbeing and careers of the minority musicians being hired, or the others attentively watching, they would not publicly acknowledge this. For there is no surer way to imbed in a musician a lifelong case of imposter syndrome than to publicly suggest that his conducting is only one of two coequal reasons why he was hired, and that the other is merely an accident of birth.

Several female and minority colleagues of mine whom I’ve met on the conducting trail have told me exactly that—that they frequently ask themselves: Do I really deserve this? Or am I just an affirmative action hire? They wonder whether they’re there for their abilities or whether they’re simply being used. I have no idea whether Heyward himself feels this. But I can guarantee that based on the BSO’s handling of his appointment, other young black musicians will. And this is to say nothing of the assumptions that orchestra musicians (including his own), orchestra administrators, and listeners will make about Heyward and potentially about other minority musicians as a result.

You ask: How should the Baltimore Symphony have handled Heyward’s hiring then, assuming they genuinely considered him the best man for the job?

Here’s what I would tell them: As for the press release, stick to the music. Leave it at “We are inspired by his artistry, passion, and vision for the BSO.” If you hope to use Heyward’s race as a lever to attract new audiences and inspire young musicians, let your marketing and education offices do what they do best: emblazoning action shots of him on massive banners and hanging them on telephone poles all over town. Or perhaps sending the maestro himself, not your assistant conductor, to present music-in-schools programs in Baltimore’s disadvantaged districts.

But if you truly wish to support the career of your young music director or the others who might follow in his footsteps, one thing you should never do is tell them, along with the wider world, that they’re there because they’re black.