On the Job with...

Monday, March 28, 2005

Carl Topilow, music director and conductor, Cleveland Pops Orchestra and Orchestral Program, Cleveland Institute of Music

AGE: 58

LIVES IN: Beachwood

RESPONSIBILITIES: For the Cleveland Pops Orchestra, he conducts rehearsals and concerts and selects the programs and guest artists. At the Cleveland Institute of Music, he conducts rehearsals and concerts, is in charge of programming, makes orchestral assignments and teaches the Masters program and the beginning course in orchestral conducting. In both roles he participates in fund-raising. "The older you get, the more you rely on your experience. When you've conducted a piece for the third and fourth time, it's much easier than the first time, but you are constantly refining and improving your interpretation."

EXPERIENCE: He's the founding conductor of Cleveland Pops Orchestra, where he has been for the last 10 years. He has spent the last 24 years at the Cleveland Institute of Music. Each summer for the last 27 years, he has served as music director of the National Repertory Orchestra in Breckenridge, Colo. He also has appeared as guest conductor with 72 orchestras in 11 countries.

EDUCATION: Bachelor's of music, clarinet performance, 1968, Master's, music education, 1969, both from the Manhattan School of Music, New York City.

WORST JOB EXPERIENCE: "At an outdoor concert in Cleveland, when I picked up my clarinet to play, nothing came out because the reed had dried up. The orchestra found it very amusing. Since I now use synthetic plastic reeds, this doesn't happen anymore."

BEST JOB EXPERIENCE: "My two greatest rewards are seeing my students succeed and sharing the joy of music with people." (Thirty-one of his students, at the Cleveland Institute of Music or the National Repertory Orchestra, have been members of the Cleveland Orchestra.)

BEST ADVICE: "Don't go into music professionally unless you are so passionate about it that you absolutely and positively can't be without it."

BEST STRESS BUSTER: "Golf actually allows me to forget just about everything, though I suppose that if you take it too seriously it can induce its own stress."

MENTORS: Conducting teachers Leon Barzin and Otto Werner-Mueller. "They really understood the art of conducting."

CAREER GOALS: To continue doing what he's doing "for as long as possible."

HOBBIES: Reading historical fiction, traveling to Europe, playing golf, watching Cleveland sports teams and studying French, German, Spanish and "especially Italian - I just have a love of the country, music and its people."