Shop Name: Orchestre symphonique de sorcellerie (OSS) | Wizarding Symphony Orchestra (WSO)
Street Address: 8 Rue de la Lumière, Chatoeil, France
Executive Director: Hervé Mondesir (NPC)
Music Director: Manu Daffé (NPC)
Description:
History
The WSO was conceived in 1994 by Manu Daffé, a young, talented French-Senegalese conductor with an ambitious vision beyond his own craft. While his career started at an opera in Lyon, he had a passion for orchestral music. His time at the opera, however, introduced him to the wealth of talent of wizarding effects artists, costume designers, and more. Daffé imagined utilizing this untapped talent to enhance orchestral performances, and bringing together performing artists in an organization that would preserve, innovate, and educate.
However, finding people to invest in his vision was difficult. He wanted the best of the best, but pulling them from prestigious established organizations with little to offer them but the professional satisfaction of achieving his goal proved to be a hard sell. He began to realize that he would need financial and reputational incentives. In 1996 he began appearing at gatherings of the cultural-minded elite and lobbying for patrons. With the help of some gradual interest, the WSO concept came to the attention of influential people like André Deveaux, who helped suggest to his peers that it would be a very good thing for the preservation of Wizarding culture and as a gathering place. In 1997, Daffé secured financial backing to renovate a grand theatre in Chatoeil and a connection to Hervé Mondesir, who had turned a smaller Parisian orchestra around from near-bankruptcy and who agreed to serve as executive director, bringing his considerable connections on board. Since then, the WSO has flourished by presenting flawless performances and integrating into the social fabric of the French upper class.
Season
The WSO currently presents concerts two weekends per month between September and May. Concerts may focus on Muggle and Wizarding classics, premiere the work of current composers, and feature outstanding soloists, including youth artists. During the summer, performances become more accessible and more experimental. They perform arrangements of popular music, outdoor concerts, and an integrated performing arts production on a massive scale with huge setpieces, an original score, dancers and aerial artists, and copious effects. The WSO also performs abroad several times a year, especially during the summer outside of the regular season. Currently, they frequently visit Moscow and London, and hope to expand touring locations. All concerts incorporate some degree of magical effects, especially visual, sometimes auditory, and sometimes involving magically-mediated movement and conjuration. Some involve additional performing arts such as dance. Finally, the WSO holds a number of special events throughout the year. Certain performances, often opening nights, are reserved for season subscribers or for donors, and some events are specifically geared towards fundraising. These events are particularly well-attended by the upper classes and persist at the behest of influencing WSO patrons from that class who see them as important social events.
Building
The WSO is hosted in the Palais Beaulieu, named after the architect and as an apt descriptor of the hall itself. Formerly an elegant Beaux-Arts exterior but with a rather dilapidated interior, it has been thoroughly renovated; the non-auditorium spaces bear similarity to the Opéra Garnier with less Baroque ornamentation and ceiling painting on the interior in favor of a cleaner but no less grand design. The entrance of the Palais opens to a huge atrium featuring a grand staircase that loops from the ground to two other levels with high ceilings. There is a bar on the mezzanine. The atrium is deeper than it is wide, and the ground floor serves as the central space for special gala events. The auditorium, built in the modern era, is designed to maximize the aural experience for all attendees, not just those lucky or affluent enough to obtain the best seats; the design is similar to the Walt Disney Concert Hall, but with more traditional coloring and more lighting, like Carnegie Hall. Thanks to magic, it is also fairly flexible, and can be altered to accommodate different types of performances that may need to add a pit and leave the stage for other performers, or to remove or augment the seating behind the stage. Side wings of the Palais house rehearsal spaces for dancers and musicians as well as smaller recital halls suitable for masterclasses and other aspects of the educational mission of the WSO.
Education
The WSO is dedicated first and foremost to performance, and second to cultural preservation and innovation, but a large component of its mission is also educational. This informed its location in Chatoeil, which is both a wholly Wizarding city as well as accessible by the students of Beauxbatons. The WSO invests in youth education in several ways. First, it offers workshops in set or costume design, effects artistry, and other important supporting arts throughout the year. Older students and recent graduates may take summer internships. There are summer training programs open to students from around the world in music and dance, as well as conducting and composing. Performing students become part of the youth ensemble during their time and also perform in smaller chamber-scale groups. Experienced conductors, performers, and composers sometimes spend six months to one year in residence at the WSO, and typically teach a number of masterclasses and contribute to the summer programs. Finally, the WSO sponsors annual competitions for young soloists, who are offered the chance to perform with the WSO, as well as young composers, who have the opportunity to have their work premiered by the ensemble.
