Outgoing conductor Jaffe reflects on 8 years leading the Auburn Symphony

They're going to miss each other, conductor Peter Jaffe and the Auburn Symphony. Jaffe, who's stepping down after eight years, will miss the inspiring process of preparing for live performances, as well as the actual live performances. Principal clarinetist Patty Wassum will miss how Jaffe challenged the musicians individually and an as orchestra. Jaffe will also miss the outreach educational programs that hold a special place in his heart. Symphony Executive Director Anne Brown will miss Jaffe's musicianship, his unique touch for working with the strings – and his sense of humor. And Jaffe will miss the musicians he described as "amazing," including many who had conservatory training, then took another career path but continued to play. "They are big shoes to fill," Brown says. "He definitely brought the Auburn Symphony up. He knows how to read the musicians well. He just raised them to a higher level." Jaffe will remain with the Folsom Lake and Stockton symphonies, and he has played an advisory role in Auburn's search for a replacement through a 2020 season canceled by the COVID-19 pandemic. Jaffe replaced Auburn Maestro Michael Goodwin, who died in a car accident in 2012. Jaffe described Goodwin as a "really powerful community and musical force" who would "sometimes call me up and shop ideas with me. We used to share ideas with each other." Jaffe reached out to Auburn following Goodwin's death, asked how he could help and wound up conducting the Mondavi concert. "Then, they just sort of persuaded me to stay on," he says. "Fast forward to now, the schedule is just so insane. It was a very difficult decision, all the commuting, keeping all things going at once." But "going" is what the local symphony continued to do under Jaffe. Wassum has chaired the search committee and said she's working on each repertoire the symphony has played under Jaffe. Her favorite? She couldn't decide on one. Wassum remembers "different pieces for different reasons," including Sinfonia Concertante by Mozart, and what she considers the symphony's most difficult piece, the Alpine Symphony by Strauss. Wassum recalled the San Francisco Symphony as the only other orchestra in Northern California to perform the Alpine Symphony. "It's hard to play, very challenging," she says. "It's long, in terms of overall endurance, for close to an hour." Brought to the Auburn Symphony by Jaffe. "He runs a very efficient, well-paced rehearsal," says Wassum, who is in her 10th year with the symphony, holds a Master's in music and teaches music in middle school. "When you are in rehearsal, you are there to push yourself. It's exciting." Jaffe discussed positive reinforcement, fixing things, "always done with love," and the magic of a live performance. "We aren't complete without communicating with the audience. My eight years with Auburn have been just that," says Jaffe who, in addition to a Master's and Doctorate in music, has a math degree. "When I hear the glorious sounds the symphony makes, you can hear the positive vibes from the audience. That's what the performance is all about. It's what we're all thirsting for." Jaffe went on to describe his 2½ axioms of why live performance is exciting, starting with the half axiom: the audience itself being like a live communal experience. "I was at one of the original screenings of the very first 'Star Wars' in 1977," Jaffe says. "It was an old-fashion big theater. When the opening credits rolled on the screen, everybody in the audience cheered. The first time the Millennium Falcon went into hyperspace, everybody in the entire crowd went, 'Ooooohh.' In a live performance, you don't get that if you're watching at home alone. "The full axiom you can't substitute for is synergy; the whole is greater than the sum of the parts. You see that come to life on the stage you can't see in a recording. You can practically taste the experience. You can't do that on the internet or a CD. The other full axiom is what I like to call 'elegant risk.' There's always a possibility we can screw up. The fact that it could happen, and we're defying those risks is what makes it exciting. The standard of excellence by which we're expected to deliver is we don't want any mistakes. You want to see it with no filter at some point, even if you have binoculars. You want to see something happening live. That's why I love performing live." Wassum said Jaffe challenged the musicians and the orchestra, taught them how to be better musicians and an orchestra, and guided them – and it – to the next level "and the next level and the next level" in a couple of ways: "One is repertoire selection. He put some challenging music in front of us," she says. "But he's also a master at rehearsal techniques. He's impeccably prepared for the first rehearsal. He knows what's going to be difficult, he anticipates it, and he knows how to correct it. He has a lot of insight, particularly for strings, about what kinds of things for a violin for example are going to be challenging. He knows how to work through those things, break down the hard parts. … so it can become more relatable or simpler. And he has incredibly high expectations. If it wasn't good enough, it wasn't good enough and we needed to do better. We've been incredibly fortunate to have the opportunity to work with him the last eight years. We are very much so" going to miss him. Says Jaffe: "What really is inspiring is the process by which we prepare for an event. Our performance is like the final game if you will. When you're reaching toward that goal, and I like the conduit of energy, when you achieve something in a rehearsal, we just made that better. That's what makes everybody inspired."