Venezuela Theatre Newsroom

The San Diego Symphony’s Music Director and Conductor Rafael Payare took up the notoriously difficult French horn at the age of 13. During an hour-long Zoom interview while he was in Montreal, I asked how he had managed to become a soloist less than six months later! “I have to admit it was a little bit fast,” he said. Not the haughty egotistical answer I might have gotten from film conductor-stereotypes. His local youth orchestra, a part of Venezuela’s extensive El Sistema program, needed horns, so he joined a few weeks after first picking one up. “For a couple of classes, I could only play one scale, but somehow something clicked, and I just started playing more.” Less than half a year later he passed an audition for the national youth orchestra, and later became Principal Horn with the prestigious Simón Bolívar Youth Orchestra, the one that first brought Gustavo Dudamel to the attention of the conducting world.

On this most romantic day of the year, we can't help but wonder... what is the greatest Broadway love song ever? BroadwayWorld continues our great tradition of finding that consensus- and this year we have more answers than ever!

Tune in right here today, October 1 (12pm ET), as he chats with Broadway's favorite couple, Orfeh and Andy Karl, who will headline concerts with Seth Rudetsky on October 4 (8pm) and 5 (3pm).