The Hawaiʻi Symphony Orchestra welcomed its first music director this past summer.
Dane Lam is originally from Brisbane, Australia, and will lead dozens of local orchestra musicians for the next five years.
"There's always a lot of learning to do when you start any new position and move to a new community," he said. "One of the things that I found has been most useful in getting in touch with the aspirations and the dreams that people within and outside the organization have for the symphony is just to listen."
Lam's extensive background goes back to leading an orchestral revival in Australia following the COVID-19 lockdown and being a principal conductor China's Xi'an Symphony Orchestra in 2014.
He was born to an Australian, Anglo-Celtic mother and a Singaporean-Chinese father. Lam said he likes to tell people that he's from a distant neighboring island across the Pacific Ocean.
However, he's no stranger to Hawaiʻi. He was a guest conductor for the orchestra last year and this past July, he conducted "Dane's Ultimate Mixtape" at the Waikīkī Shell.
"The whole concept behind it was like those of us who can remember cassette players, making mixtapes for our high school crushes," he said. This was the same kind of thing. It was like a little love letter to Hawaiʻi," he said.
Lam said this past concert was an appetizer for HSO's upcoming musical season, which will begin Oct. 7 and end on June 16, 2024.
The season kicks off with the Hapa Symphony and will include collaborative performances with local artists like Paula Fuga, Jake Shimabukuro and Robert Cazimero.
The audience can also expect to hear the classical works of Beethoven and Tchaikovsky.
"We're gonna hear masterworks of the orchestral repertoire," Lam said. "This is music that really belongs to everybody around the world, regardless of nationality."
But Lam said there will also be new school music. He said the season will wrap up with Michael Thomas Foumai, who wrote "Raise Hawaiki." The production is about 70 minutes long, and it's in English and ʻŌlelo Hawaiʻi.
"It's all about the voyage of the Hōkūleʻa and all the trials and tribulations that these people encountered," he said. "There's a big choir, big orchestra, there's soloists, and it's something totally unique that you wouldn't hear anywhere else in the world. It really belongs to Hawaiʻi."
Lam's job is more than waving a stick and leading a group of up to 80 musicians.
"To be a conductor is to look at a piece of music, some of which was written hundreds of years ago, some pieces written just yesterday, and work out how soft is soft, how slow is slow, how loud is loud, how fast is fast," he said. "And (we) make these interpretations decisions that we can lead a group of very fine musicians, which can be quite subjective."
He also said his job is multifaceted, adding that he has to combine the musical seasons, invite guests and artists, audition new orchestra members and more.
"I'm always out there meeting members of the community, members, people in schools, teachers, leaders of the community just to work out how a symphony orchestra in 21st century Hawaiʻi can serve its constituents and serve its community," he said.
