By VERNON ROBISON
The Progress
The Southern Nevada Symphony Orchestra will begin its 9th season next week with a concert entitled “Sounds of the Season” on Saturday evening, Nov. 18 at 7 pm.
The orchestra will be returning to the Casablanca Showroom this season. This will give more room for a larger audience. The group has been selling out the house over the past couple of years at the Mesquite Community Theatre.
But that isn’t the only thing new for the local ensemble this season. The group has selected a new conductor, Susan Thiriot, who has brought with her a new energy and vibrance to the orchestra.
“We have had several rehearsals now with Susan and it has been amazing!” said SNSO Board President Larry LeMieux. “She is really, really good.”
Thiriot is a seasoned musician and educator who currently lives in St. George, UT. She has played french horn with the SNSO for the past several years.
She spent many years teaching band and music for the Clark County School District in Las Vegas schools. During part of that time, she began going to school at UNLV in the evenings to earn a masters degree in conducting.
“It was a great experience for me,” Thiriot said of this added training. “It really changed my understanding of a conductor’s role. It was a lot of fun.”
In addition to educational settings, Thiriot also has conducted for a community orchestra in North Las Vegas.
Thiriot has been married for 20 years. She and her husband have two daughters: a high school senior and a seventh grader.
In the summer of 2020, the family relocated to St. George, which is where her husband was born and raised. But thus far, she has held off going back to teaching. “I’ve had some offers but it just hasn’t felt like the right time or the right fit,” Thiriot said. “I’ve been doing other things so that I can be a little more available for my kids. I do like to keep my hand in the music bucket as much as I can.”
That is why, when the SNSO board called and asked her to step up from the ranks onto the conductors podium, she was pleased to do so.
“I am just super excited that they are giving me the opportunity to come in as a somewhat outside member of the group,” Thiriot said. “I just really respect the community and want to make sure that it stays everything that the community wants, expects and enjoys.”
Thiriot also said that she was humbled to step into the spot of former SNSO director and founder, Selmer Spitzer. Spitzer organized the orchestra back in the fall of 2014 and worked hard to build it into a strong and beloved program in the community.
“Without Selmer, this orchestra wouldn’t even exist,” Thiriot said. “I think that we owe him so much gratitude and respect for having the vision to actually start an orchestra in a community like Mesquite; that really has become quite loved by the people. I greatly respect what he has done and I am honored and grateful to be the next conductor of this group!”
LeMieux had similar praise for Spitzer’s vision and accomplishments. “We wouldn’t be here with out Selmer’s insight and organizational skills,” he said. “He did something that probably nobody else would ever attempt to do: that is starting a symphony orchestra in a small town like this. That just isn’t done out there nowadays. Yet he accomplished it.”
The November 18 concert program will attempt to tie together various elements of the final two months of the year. It will begin with a lineup of patriotic tunes honoring Veterans Day. Then it will transition into some familiar classical pieces before ending with a number of holiday tunes.
Tickets to the concert are $25 and can be purchased by clicking HERE.
