For aspiring orchestra conductor Katherine Domingo '96, brandishing a small wooden baton before a room full of musicians, is as much an artistic expression as drawing a bow across a violin's strings.
"Conducting is playing an instrument," Domingo, who plays the clarinet, said, "except my instrument is the orchestra." Her primary love is conducting, which is why she founded Dartmouth's newest classical music ensemble, the Dartmouth Chamber Orchestra, last December.
Domingo said she wanted to create beautiful music and a place for conducting students like herself to practice their skills.
On Jan. 27, the DCO gave its first performance at Rollins Chapel. It was Domingo's first time conducting a formal concert in front of a significant crowd.
Standing on a podium in front of her 27 musicians and with her back to more than 150 audience members, Domingo led her orchestra through Handel's "Overture to Ode for St. Cecilia's Day," Telemann's "Trumpet Concerto" and Haydn's "Symphony No. 21." The orchestra played for 45 minutes.
Music Professor Melinda O'Neal, the DCO's faculty advisor, was pleased with the performance.
"It was a wonderful start for what will hopefully be a tradition at Dartmouth of a student-led, student and community orchestra," she said. "I thought the repertoire was well selected, and the performance good."
"It's a really wonderful thing that an orchestra can live in its own right and be a vehicle for students to become better conductors," O'Neal added.
The DCO's second concert is tentatively scheduled for May 18 in Rollins Chapel. Domingo said the group is learning pieces by Cubert, Mozart and Bartok.
While the orchestra is officially recognized by the music department, the DCO receives much of its funding from residence halls, Greek houses and the Office of Residential Life.
Domingo, a music major, said she founded DCO as part of her independent study in conducting for Music 88.
"I needed more conducting experience," she said. "Also, there is a void of chamber orchestra music being performed here at Dartmouth. The Dartmouth Symphony Orchestra is big and very seldom does it perform a Handel piece or a Haydn symphony."
Domingo said the much larger DSO tends to play 19th-century romantic music by composers such as Tchaikovsky, Brahms and Shostakovich, which is more grandiose than the DCO's repertoire and more popular with students.
" 'Chamber' means it requires fewer people," Domingo said. "Whereas the DSO has about 14 first violins, I have five. So it's a lot more exposed. It's not as full, it's not as big a sound and so a lot more responsibility is placed on each musician. No one can hide."
DCO features all the instruments standard to chamber orchestras: violins, violas, cellos, basses, flutes, bassoons, French horns, a harpsichord and an oboe. Like the DSO, the DCO is open to any and all musicians in the area, not only members of the College community.
For practices on Saturday, musicians lug their instruments from campus dorms as well from Lyme, South Royalton, Lebanon and White River Junction. Domingo says she even has two high school students on board.
Joanna Gibson '98, the orchestra's harpsichordist, praised Domingo as the "driving force" behind the group.
"Kathy's enthusiasm really keeps the group together and psyched on what we're doing," she said.
"I study piano but I'm playing the harpsichord for the orchestra, which is very different," Gibson said. "Under Kathy's conducting it was a terrific experience. Pianists are kind of loners, so to be able to play in an orchestra has been a great time."
Gibson said she plans to continue with the DCO after Domingo graduates this spring, but said the orchestra will not be the same without its founder.
Domingo said she likes the orchestra as an instrument more than the clarinet.
"I feel more connected to the music. You get to hear the entire thing as a whole instead of just playing one line," she said.
"When I go to learn a piece of music, I have to learn each and every line see how it all fits together and try and make music out of the little black dots that are on the page."
"I think of the role of conductor as analogous to someone in the middle of Grand Central Station whose job it is to make sure that trains go in and out of the terminal on schedule and make sure there aren't any head-on collisions or accidents."
O'Neal said conducting students "need to have a strong impulse of will. That is, the image of the sound is in their heads and their gestures must effectively reflect the image of the sound, obviously taken from the musical score."
Domingo said her responsibilities as director of the DCO include all the logistics behind the performance, from ordering the music to making sure there are enough parts for everyone to play, to reserving practice and performance space.
Domingo said the orchestra has been great fun and that she hopes it will continue after her graduation as a place for young conductors to practice their skills.
