But Lockhart remains a crucial, beloved figure for the Boston Symphony, most of whose players he conducts far more often than their music director. And he has the experience and skills of a proper musician: He led the Utah Symphony for 11 years and has been artistic director of the Brevard Music Center Summer Institute and Festival since 2007. “He comes in knowing what he’s going to do, and we just follow him,” said Suzanne Nelsen, a Pops bassoonist.
His collaborators are similarly effusive. “Keith and the musicians, they know where the beat is,” said Branford Marsalis, the jazz saxophonist, “so it never feels like it falls into affectation or stereotype, which are the worst experiences ever.” Ben Folds, the singer-songwriter, applauded the Pops for keeping the dignified environment of a symphony orchestra intact. “When you’re playing with Keith,” he said, “he’s taking the inside of your music seriously.” Bernadette Peters, Broadway royalty, confided that on her phone, she keeps a secret recording of the Pops performing a lullaby she wrote about a dog. “He gets all these players to play as a whole, and make music with me,” she said of Lockhart. “It’s basically a miracle.”
Lockhart is also one of the few conductors today who is deeply rooted in his community, so much so that even its baseball team speaks highly of him. Alex Cora, the manager of the Boston Red Sox, appeared at the Holiday Pops in 2018, and last year invited Lockhart to talk to his players at spring training.
“It was good for our guys, especially seeing it from a different perspective,” Cora said. “Probably for them, it was like: ‘Oh, he’s a conductor, what is it, what’s the big thing? He’s just, you know, moving his hands and whatever.’ No, no, no, no, he’s doing a lot from that platform. It was good to have him around.”
