By MITCHELL CRAWFORD

Andrew Litton will conduct the Juilliard Orchestra on April 4 in Alice Tully Hall.

When Andrew Litton stepped down as the music director of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra last May, he was walking away from a job for which many other conductors might give their left arm. After all, it is still rare for an American conductor to be chosen the leader of an eminent American orchestra; that Litton managed to be picked for the post at 35 is even more significant. In fact, his biography is filled with such felicitous accomplishments and, given the public and critical success he has garnered, there seems to be no limit to what he may achieve. Beginning a new chapter of his burgeoning career, Litton was appointed principal conductor of Norway's Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra in 2003; the reputation of the venerable ensemble, once led by Grieg, has since only increased.

Litton's remarkable ascendancy to prominence in the conducting world has been accompanied by stories of growth and renewal in every institution with which he has been associated. One need only look to Minnesota's annual Sommerfest, of which Litton is artistic director, in order to see what he is able to achieve in circumstances fraught with limitations other conductors might find overwhelming. Charged with reviving the festival's sagging ticket sales and dwindling audiences, Litton has effected an about-face which has quelled any fear that Sommerfest was on its way to becoming yet another casualty in the battle to preserve classical music's cultural relevance. The trick, according to Litton, was "simply to strip the varnish back and revisit the original concept of the festival when it was so successful over 25 years ago." In the case of Sommerfest, this meant a greater emphasis on opera and a heavy dose of Austrian music.

In spite of this and other successes, Litton, 47, remains modest and self-effacing; he cites the efforts of colleagues, associates, and patrons as paramount in his program-building endeavors. Still, the magnitude of his achievement would seem to betray more than a mere cursory involvement by Litton himself.

The job which most prepared him to undertake the challenge of Sommerfest was unquestionably his position in Dallas. Given the somewhat tepid state of affairs as regards classical music in this country, the most arresting statistic from his Dallas years must be that the orchestra's endowment grew from $17 million to more than $100 million during his tenure. Litton credits the unparalleled rise to his fostering of personal relationships with patrons, adding, "It's a very faulty assumption on the part of fund-raisers that you can take someone out to dinner and then ask them for money." One great advantage to Litton in his efforts to achieve these close relationships was his residency in Dallas itself. "They had me guaranteed for 16 weeks [a year] and during that time, it wasn't just going to the concerts. It was lots of lunches, post-concert dinners … it's a very long-term process, but it's the way you achieve things. It's not just one meal; it's four or five meals, and when you're comfortable enough with someone you say, 'Hey, we have this project we'd like you to be a part of.' There's no quick fix; you have to work at it."

Andrew Litton at the piano: “The piano was a means to an end,” he says. (Photo by Danny Turner )

But if Litton's years in Dallas are marked by the boom of the endowment, Litton himself will be remembered as the maestro who brought the orchestra to an extraordinarily high level of execution. Under his direction, the orchestra toured Europe three times and made a number of visits to New York's Carnegie Hall. Litton also conducted an impressive volume of highly acclaimed recordings, including one that garnered the Classical Brits/BBC Critics Award.

With the Bergen Philharmonic, Litton once again has an accomplished, if lesser known, ensemble he says he feels he can bring to a higher level of playing while expanding the orchestra's acclaim. He has designed an aggressive touring and recording schedule, including a 12-concert U.S. tour in November that will bring the Bergen Philharmonic to Carnegie Hall.

Ironically, as Litton has gained more and more renown as an orchestral conductor, he has had less time to devote to what he calls his "favorite form of musical artistic expression." Opera, though, is never absent from his engagements, and the maestro looks forward to growing a new opera company in Bergen. For Litton, "there is no better way to teach an orchestra to breathe, be flexible and accompany" than by accompanying opera. Likewise, the challenge presented to the opera conductor is much greater than in the comparatively routine task of leading a group of highly trained musicians in an orchestral concert: "You also have singers, malfunctioning props, bad stage directors, choruses that are 50 yards away and not watching—there is much more to control," says Litton, though he is quick to add, "Personally, I love that challenge."

When Maestro Litton conducts the Juilliard Orchestra on April 4, it will be a homecoming of sorts. Born in New York, Litton attended Juilliard as a pianist and, later, a conductor. Despite his natural talent for the piano, his ambition since age 10 had been to be a conductor: "The truth is that … piano was a means to an end," he says. About his time at the School, Litton recalls that "none of us had cell phones or computers. There were no dorms. Everyone struggled to find an affordable place to live and had to use pay phones to communicate … there was also less of a school spirit—Juilliard logo items like T-shirts were forbidden. I remember a classmate of mine printing some up and almost getting expelled! I don't think today's Juilliard students, if subjected to a sudden time warp, would survive in 1980!"

For his program at Juilliard, Litton has chosen to feature the works of Verdi, Walton, and Richard Strauss. The choice of a work by Strauss, a composer Litton "loves," was easy for him: "The last and only other time I conducted at the School, there were two Strauss works on the program and I was struck by how important it is for young people to get to know these works and the challenges they present … [Eine Alpensinfonie] is a remarkably colorful tone poem that takes you on a journey that most of us only get to experience these days in an IMAX theater!" The Walton Viola Concerto, Litton says, "is a masterpiece of its kind. It is Walton's best concerto and I think it may offer the violist [in this case, student David Kim] one of the best concerti in the repertoire." Opening the concert will be Verdi's Overture to La forza del destino, a work highlighting Litton's own love of opera.

Juilliard Orchestra Andrew Litton, conductor David Kim, viola Avery Fisher Hall Wednesday, April 4, 8 p.m. See the Calendar of Events for more information.

Andrew Litton has a great deal to be proud of, but one gets the sense that he is always working to achieve a higher goal. Perhaps this has simply become de rigueur for a man who achieved more by the age of 40 than many conductors do in a lifetime. Indeed, it is not hard to imagine someone with so many accolades already behind him wondering, "What next?" But if any one thing is certain, it is that Litton, in his position as one of the leading conductors of his generation, is making a profound impact on audiences, critics, and the general public around the globe. Considering his history, it's probably safe to say that's unlikely to change.

Mitchell Crawford is a third-year organ student.