On August 6 at the Hollywood Bowl, the LA Philharmonic will perform works from Russian composers Sergei Prokofiev and Dmitri Shostakovich. The conductor: Ryan Bancroft, a 34-year-old who played trumpet in Lakewood before studying conducting at CalArts and in Europe. Today, he leads several European orchestras, including the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra.
Bancroft’s career is rooted in the mentorship he got in LA public schools. He points to an elementary school teacher who taught him how to play the violin. Then he then picked up the trumpet, which he says was “the start of everything.”
Bancroft’s middle school band director pushed him to explore other instruments, such as a bass clarinet, cello, and flute. “It became an obsession.”
Bancroft continues, “I didn't have many friends, but I had friends in music.”
The LA native got his start in conducting about 14 years ago after his father passed away. Mozart’s “Requiem” became his dad’s favorite classical piece after watching the 1984 film Amadeus on his first date with Bancroft’s mom.
In honor of his father, Bancroft organized a choir and orchestra of his peers, and put on a performance of “Requiem” at a local church. While the occasion was somber, Bancroft describes the experience as phenomenal. He went on to study conducting at CalArts and the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland.
In 2018, at age 28, he gained international recognition after winning first prize at the Malko Competition for Young Conductors, which he calls the “Academy Awards for conductors.”
“It's a competition where you have access to a world-class orchestra. … It feels like an audition — 24 or so competitors show up, and they whittle it down over a few days. And if you win the competition, of course, there's a monetary prize [€20,000]. But more importantly, you get to conduct, immediately, 24 orchestras around the world, basically, the next day.”
Bancroft says the experience was one of the few times in his professional life that he wasn’t terribly nervous, due partly to how he got ready for it.
“I treated preparing for that competition like a job. My dad would always say to me in a flippant way, ‘If you're going to do something, you might as well do it to win it.’”
He adds, “It really just translated as ‘just go in with as much preparation as possible and simply have a good time.’ So I just led with trying to make as much music as possible and meet great musicians at the same time.”
In addition to his role as chief conductor for the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra, Bancroft is the principal conductor of the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, and an artist-in-association with the Tapiola Sinfonietta in Finland.
Bancroft takes pride in all that responsibility. “If I’m going to have a full-time job, this is the one I was hoping for: Three jobs that take quite a lot of effort. And it's because the people that play in these orchestras really want to do a great job as well.”
As conductor of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, Bancroft regularly features lesser-known composers, such as Swedish pianist Laura Netzel.
“Her music, in a lot of ways, sounds like Chopin's music, and for those that love Chopin, I do think she would be a huge discovery. … Whenever I'm in Sweden, Laura Netzel is a composer that Swedish musicians take very seriously, and I'm hoping one day she reaches far and wide.”
His passion for eclectic programming stems from the diverse music of his childhood.
“I grew up in a family where classical music was not the main music that was being played in that household. My father listened to smooth jazz. My mom listened to rock and heavy metal. My brothers were very interested in rap. So my tastes have always been a bit broad, but I think I've just always been a curious person.”