In Saturday’s (3/9) Detroit News, Chris Felcyn writes, “On a recent Sunday evening at The Max Fisher Music Center in Detroit, amid the cordial greetings of friends coming together, various strings and winds were warming up for the evening’s rehearsal. It’s a scene quite routine at The Max. But this was not your typical orchestra. The concertmaster is a second-year medical student at Wayne State University. One of the violinists is a respected cardiologist at the Detroit Medical Center. On clarinet is the chief of urology at the Karmanos Cancer Institute. This is the Detroit Medical Orchestra, amateur musicians made up of health professionals who get together ‘to explore the connections between music and healing’ and support area medical charities. … Driving the process is Elliot Moore, who’s working on his conducting doctorate at the University of Michigan. As conductor of the DMO, he’s noticed advantages to working with a band of medical professionals. ‘There’s not a person in this orchestra who’s not brilliant,’ Moore points out. ‘I know I’m working with people who have a high level of intellect. So I speak to them like they’re musicians. I don’t dumb it down. It’s never, “What can this orchestra do?” I’m always speaking from the music.’ ”
Posted March 12, 2013
