The Dallas and Fort Worth symphony orchestras are losing two key wind players.
Erin Hannigan, the DSO’s principal oboe since 2001 — and an adjunct associate professor at Southern Methodist University — will leave at the end of this season to become professor of oboe at Rice University in Houston. And Joshua Elmore, in just his third season as the FWSO’s principal bassoon, will take that chair in the San Francisco Symphony.
Wind instruments represent the coloristic soul of the orchestra, and often supply the most distinctive melodic lines. Hannigan’s warm tone and eloquent expressivity will be much missed.
“Playing principal oboe in an orchestra truly is a lifestyle,” she says, “so everything I do from the moment I wake up revolves around what I need to do on stage each day. While teaching at Rice will still be very intense, it will offer a new set of parameters for living.
“The students there are exceptional, and the oboe reputation has been stellar. I also feel the creative community at Rice will be wonderful. So many faculty have already reached out about performing chamber music, and there’s so much left for me to explore in repertoire beyond the symphonic realm.”
One of the newest and youngest of the FWSO, Elmore was a brilliant and elegant soloist last June in Mozart’s Bassoon Concerto.
“I’ve worked with incredible musicians, conductors, and a community that has ed me in so many ways,” he says of his time in Fort Worth. “ing the San Francisco Symphony, an orchestra with a rich history of innovation and excellence, feels like an exciting new chapter that will challenge me artistically and inspire me to bring the most beautiful music to the world.”
