Fate plays a hand in all things. Take Andrew Constantine, music director of the Fort Wayne Philharmonic, for example. Growing up in England, Constantine was more concerned about kicking a soccer ball on the field than having anything to do with music. But when a program at his school introduced him to the cello, fate began the process of guiding him to where he is today.
At the school Constantine attended, a system was in place that offered free music lessons to students who would benefit from them. In what Constantine describes as a “fluke”, a cello was thrust into his hands, but he made no progress at all.
“I didn’t practice, that was the missing ingredient. I was more interested in playing around with the other kids in my class,” Constantine says. “When I was around 12 or 13 years old, my teacher decided she was going to push harder. She gave me some LPs of a famous cello player and I became smitten for the first time.”
It was that first spark that encouraged Constantine to pursue music. He attended a special music school in England and fell deeper in love. At the time, Constantine had an interest in conducting, but didn’t share the desire with anyone and didn’t know how to get into it.
“I had one chance at high school and it was pretty disastrous,” Constantine says. “One day the conductor told me to come and conduct, and I didn’t have a clue what I was doing.”
He persisted and practiced to develop and refine his craft. When Constantine went to university it was as a philosophy major – that career choice lasted a day. He changed his major to music and began his journey.
Later on in his educational career, Constantine put together a small orchestra in England for a final performance exam. It was only supposed to last for one concert, but 25 years later, the orchestra is still growing and performing under a new director. Constantine directed that orchestra for about 18 years. During his tenure he took the orchestra to Russia, Germany, France, the Czech Republic and Luxembourg.
“It was an interesting lesson, not only learning how to conduct, but learning how to run an orchestra.” Constantine says. “But that’s the kind of thing you have to do if you want to be a conductor and you don’t have a dad with a huge checkbook to buy it all for you. “
Constantine has passed his musical talents along to his children. His daughter, Rosie, is a viola player.
“I didn’t want my children to get involved in music at all,” Constantine says. “”It’s so difficult and full of challenges.”
Regardless of his preference, Rosie has been excelling at the viola. Constantine is married to Jane, has a son, Michael (who is interested in soccer like his father) and a dog, Tink.
Constantine had to go through an extensive two-year process to become the music director of the Fort Wayne Philharmonic. The first stage has to do with how you look on paper, Constantine says.
From there, it’s all a matter of talking to the applicant’s contacts and putting the applicants through try-outs of sorts. Constantine says that at one point, the last few finalists were invited to conduct the Philharmonic during the Masterworks Series and chamber orchestra during the Spectrum Series.
Coming to Fort Wayne was something that Constantine really wanted to do. He says that many people from Fort Wayne don’t understand that their city has quite a reputation in the music business.
“It’s a reputation that is founded on years of great music making in Fort Wayne,” Constantine says. “It’s a community that has been incredibly supportive of the Philharmonic for a long time. Not every city has all those ingredients.”
Constantine wants to make the orchestra as accessible in the community as it can be.
“We all know that classical music has its addicts and people that have grown up with it that know how wonderful it can be,” Constantine says. “Then there are people out there that say ‘I’ve never had any connection with that music, it’s stuffy and not for me.”
He is looking to change attitudes. With the new Signature Series, Constantine is trying to break down the resistance to classical music. The series is more casual and is designed to make everyone more comfortable, while still being at a high level. Constantine would like to bring in music that will make people love it as much as he has in the last few years.
“That’s probably the biggest job of a music director: to keep things fresh and convincing people that they haven’t heard everything,” Constantine says. “There is so much great music out there that even I, spending all my life trying to find out about it, will never get to hear because there’s just too much.
Constantine is striving to make the orchestra relevant to as many people as possible. There are new and unusual events coming up for the Fort Wayne Philharmonic. One of the events combines newer contemporary music with images from the Hubble Space Telescope.
Fate has helped Andrew Constantine along the road from young soccer player and musical slacker to a successful music director. With a little determination and a little less soccer ball kicking, Constantine has carved his way into the Philharmonic family.
