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Winnipeg Free Press

‘Not just one of the greats, she's one of the greatest,' Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra's Daniel Raiskin says of retiring concertmaster Gwen Hoebig

When Gwen Hoebig takes the stage at the Centennial Concert Hall this weekend, it will be for the last time as the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra's concertmaster. After 37 years, the renowned first-chair violinist will be taking a well-earned rest, but not before a pair of shows celebrating her glittering career. Celebrating Gwen Hoebig Centennial Concert Hall • Saturday, 7:30 p.m. • Sunday, 2 p.m. • Tickets $25-$99 at Celebrating Gwen Hoebig Centennial Concert Hall • Saturday, 7:30 p.m. • Sunday, 2 p.m. • Tickets $25-$99 at The program ● Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Sinfonia Concertante● Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's Concerto for Violin, Piano and Orchestra● Claude Debussy's La mer ● Richard Strauss's Till Eulenspiegel To make things extra special, Hoebig will be performing alongside her family: husband and pianist David Moroz; son, violist Alexander (Sasha) Moroz; and daughter, cellist Juliana Moroz. Hoebig will be performing the entire concert, as both orchestral leader and soloist. 'To be in this position, still doing what I'm doing and loving what I'm doing, and being able to share in this way is truly remarkable,' Hoebig says over coffee. Hoebig, 65, is not retiring, to be clear. Her plan, at least as of now, is to take a one-year sabbatical and then return to the orchestra in some capacity. 'I'm hopefully going to stay in the first violin section — if they'll have me. But that's still a work in progress. I'm going to just see how it feels to not go to work on a regular basis. I definitely need a break. Like, I really need a break,' she says. Over the past couple of years, Hoebig has started to feel the physical toll of her job. 'Musicians are also athletes — we are. I've gotten to the point where my neck hurts, my shoulders hurt and I need to work with less intensity. That's really what's led to all of this,' she says. 'I feel kind of bad about it, in many ways. I feel like I'm letting Daniel (Raiskin, the WSO's music director and principal conductor) down, but I need to do this for myself.' MARK RASH PHOTO Daughter Juliana Moroz (left), son Alexander (Sasha) Moroz and husband David Moroz (right) will join Gwen Hoebig onstage. The demands of the role are not just physical. Also called 'first-chair violin,' the concertmaster not only leads the string section and tunes the orchestra, but acts, as Raiskin points out, as the medium between the conductor and the orchestra. 'A great concertmaster is not just a great player and leader and soloist, but also a very finely tuned psychologist, I would say,' he says. The concertmaster sometimes has to navigate high emotions, sometimes conflict, all with the greater good of the whole in mind. 'And I think that Gwen Hoebig is not just one of the greats, she's one of the greatest,' Raiskin says. Hoebig was 27 when she landed the prestigious role of concertmaster for the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra in 1987. The Vancouver-born violinist had gotten tenure with Orchestre symphonique de Montréal but found she didn't like being in the section. She aspired to a more leadership-type of role. MARK RASH PHOTO Gwen Hoebig is starting a one-year sabbatical and then hopes to return to the WSO in some capacity. At that time, there were three such positions open in all of Canada, in Winnipeg, Calgary and Quebec City. She got her first choice, concertmaster at the WSO, after undergoing a blind audition process in which musicians perform behind a screen so that decisions are based on virtuosity alone. 'I was thrilled I won the job, absolutely thrilled. This is my husband's hometown so I had immediate support here, which was phenomenal,' she says of the Winnipeg-born Moroz, whom she met as a student at the Juilliard School in New York City. Nearly four decades later, Winnipeg and the WSO remain her home. 'I remember being asked by one of the members of our administration at some point what my five-year plan was, and I didn't have an answer,' she says. 'I love my colleagues, I love the orchestral world, and I just have always wanted to do the best I possibly could do. And it's worked out. We've had an amazing life here.' And now, it's the beginning of a new chapter for everyone. Both Sasha and Juliana, now in their 20s, are finishing their master's degrees from Rice University in Houston, Texas. 'They're missing their grad (for this weekend's shows), but that's sort of traditional in our family,' Hoebig says. Turning the page on 37 years, however, isn't easy. When asked if giving up the role of concertmaster to someone else will be hard for her, she answers without hesitation. 'Yes. I mean, this has been what I've done. This has been what I've loved to do. And in a certain way — and I've actually been talking with my family about this — it's been too much of who I am.' MIKE DEAL / FREE PRESS FILES Violinist Gwen Hoebig is stepping down as concertmaster of the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra after two weekend shows, but she's not retiring. She's excited to explore other interests and creative impulses, to discover who she is beyond 'Gwen Hoebig, concertmaster.' 'It's been too much of my identity. I'm really grateful that I can step back from it. And it's an interesting transition. There's good days and bad days. There's days where I'm like, 'Oh, what am I doing?' But then I also know that, physically, I need to do this,' she says. Hoebig will continue to play the violin, as she has done ever since her father placed one in her hands when she was five years old. She begins every day with scales and arpeggios, and practises regularly. She will also continue to teach. She loves the challenge of working with different personalities — 'because you cannot teach two people the same way,' she says — and figuring out how to draw the best out of them. 'I love working with young people, particularly teenagers. I think it's such a pivotal time in their lives, figuring out what they want to do and inspiring them, and how to get them excited about what they're doing,' she says. Then she has what she calls her 'crazy dream.' 'I don't know if it's going to happen, but making smaller-sized instruments because that's just not done. They're always factory instruments. I don't know if I have the skill set to do that. I don't know if I can develop the skill set to do that, but I could see that being something,' she says. No matter where it takes her, her life will always involve the violin. 'I think the thing that I love the most about it — and it's taken me a long time to get here — is the realization that I can communicate way more easily, on way more of a profound level, through my music-making than I can with words,' she says. 'We are the caretakers for that next generation and the promoters of that next generation. ' –Gwen Hoebig Hoebig is shy, in her own way. She says she's fine talking to people if she knows them; if not, she'd rather stay at the back of the room. 'There is a component to this position (of concertmaster) that has been my weak link, I will say, and that is community relations. That is something that I have not done as well as I wished I could have done,' she says. She's happiest letting her playing do the talking, to let her musicianship speak for itself. But get her talking about the orchestra, her second family, and the pride is obvious. 'The orchestra is really the foundation from which all of our other arts groups function. We play for the opera, we play for the ballet. We are what allows everything to function on a really high level,' she says. 'My colleagues and I, we teach the top students in town. We are the caretakers for that next generation and the promoters of that next generation. We do so much outside of the orchestra, but it's the orchestra that allows us to do the outside work.' Winnipeg Free Press | Newsletter Winnipeg Jets Game Days On Winnipeg Jets game days, hockey writers Mike McIntyre and Ken Wiebe send news, notes and quotes from the morning skate, as well as injury updates and lineup decisions. Arrives a few hours prior to puck drop. Sign up for The Warm-Up Hoebig will be missed by her colleagues, including her good friend Karl Stobbe, who has sat immediately to her left as assistant concertmaster since he joined the orchestra in 1996. Stobbe has been appointed as the WSO's next concertmaster. 'I'm going to miss her great playing, of course, but really, mostly the friendship and the comfort level that we have with each other,' he says. 'The fact that something can happen, and we can look over at each other and know exactly how we both feel about it and what we need to do about it, that's going to be missing.' Hoebig is happy that Stobbe — who also underwent the blind-audition process — will be her successor. 'I'm really, really thrilled with the direction that they're going. I think they have made the very best decision possible,' she says. For his part, Raiskin hopes Hoebig will also miss the WSO enough to come back after her 'greatly deserved' year away. 'I think she still has a lot of years of great music and wisdom and knowledge in her, and it will be invaluable to have her back in the orchestra once again.' — with file from Conrad Sweatman Gratitude for gifts shared To everything there is a season, but for the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra's long-serving concertmaster Gwen Hoebig, there have been an astonishing 37. Revered as one of Canada's top violinists, the Vancouver-born artist lauded by WSO music director Daniel Raiskin as a 'quiet force' is notably only the fourth concertmaster in the 77-year-old organization's history. She has steadfastly set a standard of excellence since first being appointed to her position in 1987, providing a golden thread of continuity for nearly four decades. During these times of tectonic change, memories abound. I'll personally never forget witnessing Hoebig onstage during the earliest days of the now-Winnipeg New Music Festival, then led by the late, great maestro Bramwell Tovey. Their palpable rapport, mutual respect and sheer joy in making music together — which often included Tovey kibitzing with her onstage — resonated throughout every subsequent festival. MIKE DEAL / FREE PRESS FILES Hoebig has steadfastly set a standard of excellence since first being appointed to her position in 1987, Her solo performances are particularly memorable, including a breathtaking rendition of Vaughan Williams' The Lark Ascending that capped the WSO's Manitoba Remembers: A COVID Elegy in April 2022. Another personal highlight is her equally soulful performance of Peteris Vasks' Lonely Angel at the 2019 new music festival, or Brahms's Double Concerto, performed with her cellist brother, Desmond Hoebig in 2007, among so many others. As an arts journalist, I've been privileged to interview Hoebig numerous times over the last 20 years for various publications, including a large-scale feature for Symphony magazine when the WSO appeared at the 2014 Spring for Music festival, held at New York City's Carnegie Hall. Hoebig was always open when speaking about her beloved WSO — or the two children she shares with pianist husband David Moroz, cellist daughter Juliana Moroz and violist son Alexander (Sasha) Moroz, all joining her onstage this weekend. Even more personally, my family will also forever owe a debt of gratitude to Hoebig for playing an instrumental role in establishing the Neil Harris Bursary, honouring my late father and former Free Press music critic, presented each year in perpetuity through the University of Winnipeg Foundation. Both Hoebig and Tovey so generously gifted us with their artistry as headliners for a fundraiser concert held in November 2006, with the bursary's latest prize awarded to a student in the creative arts just last month. As the orchestra begins its next grand chapter with Karl Stobbe as its newest concertmaster, there is solace in the fact that this great Canadian artist will still continue to perform with the Winnipeg Chamber Music Society. She's also assured she'll be in the house this fall to cheer on the WSO, and may even be back on its stage in due course as a violin section player, seated among the colleagues she has often described as a musical family. Until then, the biggest bravo, and thank you for your sublime artistry, Gwen. You have left a legacy and shall never be forgotten. — Holly Harris Jen Zoratti Columnist Jen Zoratti is a columnist and feature writer working in the Arts & Life department, as well as the author of the weekly newsletter NEXT. A National Newspaper Award finalist for arts and entertainment writing, Jen is a graduate of the Creative Communications program at RRC Polytech and was a music writer before joining the Free Press in 2013. Read more about Jen. Every piece of reporting Jen produces is reviewed by an editing team before it is posted online or published in print – part of the Free Press 's tradition, since 1872, of producing reliable independent journalism. Read more about Free Press 's history and mandate, and learn how our newsroom operates.