Baltimore Symphony Orchestra Welcomes First Maestra

JIM LEHRER:

Finally tonight, a conductor making music and history. Jeffrey Brown has our report.

JEFFREY BROWN:

Marin Alsop has appeared with some of the world's leading orchestras for many years now. An exciting and charismatic performer, she's in great demand. And as the new music director of the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, the simple fact that she is a "she" — not "maestro," but "maestra" — Alsop is making history as the first woman to head a major American orchestra, as traditionally defined by budget size and other factors.

She's been around music as long as she can remember. Both parents played in the orchestra of the New York City Ballet. She began piano at age two, violin at age five, and she was nine when her parents took her to see a concert led by Leonard Bernstein, and her world changed.

MARIN ALSOP, American Conductor:

See, this was the problem. I was getting yelled at. I played violin by nine, and I was getting yelled at for trying to lead the orchestra from the back of the second violins. So I saw this guy and I thought, "Wait a minute. He's not getting into trouble." See? That was my motivation.

JEFFREY BROWN:

You were getting in trouble for trying to lead from way back there?

MARIN ALSOP:

From way back in the second violins.

JEFFREY BROWN:

What were you doing, waving your hands in the back of the second…

MARIN ALSOP:

No. I was moving, you know, and smiling. But then I saw Bernstein, and he was having the time of his life, and nobody was yelling at him. And I thought, "Ah, that's what I can do."

JEFFREY BROWN:

"I can do that."

MARIN ALSOP:

Yes.