Violinist Wendy Koons Meir reflects on her Oklahoma roots

For violinist Wendy Koons Meir, the Chicago Symphony’s tour concert Jan. 28 in Stillwater, Oklahoma, will amount to a homecoming.

Stillwater is just 66 miles from Oklahoma City, where she was born and became interested in music. As a high-school student, she attended the Oklahoma Summer Arts Institute for five summers and performed with the Oklahoma Youth Orchestra. One of her teachers was Lacy McLarry, the concertmaster of Oklahoma City Symphony Orchestra and its successor, the Oklahoma City Philharmonic.

For a feature published in Ovations magazine, Koons Meir spoke about returning home on this tour and working with Riccardo Muti, the CSO’s music director since 2010. “He’s probably the clearest conductor that there is, and then there’s his musicianship and his passion for the music,” she said. “When we do Verdi with him, it doesn’t get better than that.

“I mentioned the clarity of his beat because when you watch him conduct, you don’t see all of these extra huge motions that have nothing to do with the music,” she said. “That’s all about how it makes the conductor look. He’s old school, and he ‘shows the phrase.’ He’s there when you need him, and he gets out of the way when you don’t.

“He constantly reminds you to listen to the sound that you’re making and listen to what the others are doing, and blend with that and support it, or come out if you have the melody. It’s not a struggle to know where to play, so you’re not scrambling around with somebody who is actually messing you up.” 

Koons Meir is especially glad to be performing in Oklahoma. “I was very surprised when they announced the schedule for the tour and mentioned Stillwater. I said, ‘what?’ I’m looking forward to playing there and just being back there. I never thought in my wildest dreams that I would be coming to play a concert in my home state.

“It’s very special to be able to come and say to all those people who, by just buying a ticket and supporting the arts — all those people who did that when I was growing up — that they enabled me to make it into one of the top orchestras in the world.”