San Francisco Classical Voice: From Impressionism to Jazz with the Berkeley Symphony
The orchestra produced a muscular profile … the playing was excellent … Under Joseph Young, the Berkeley Symphony sounded strong, lithe, and expressive.
New Jersey Star-Ledger: NJ Symphony shows off the next generation of American talent
Young is a magisterial podium presence, and his crisp baton movements artfully sculpted the contours of Elgar’s famous score. The sweeping “Nimrod” variation was particularly strong, with Young building it to a ravishing climax without ever making it sound sappy or saccharine.
High romance and sentiment were refined into clean, bright phrasing and clear rubato. A warm and gracious accord between [Young and Elliott] meant tempos and rhythms developed freely. Young … is in high demand with a handful of leadership roles, including music director of the Berkeley Symphony.
The Daily Californian: Review of the Berkeley Symphony & the Marcus Roberts Trio
For [Rhapsody in Blue], Young enlisted the staggering skills of the Marcus Roberts Trio…It was Young’s recruitment of this group — to improvise alongside the symphony on James P. Johnson’s “Yamekraw” and “Rhapsody” — that cemented “Rhapsody in Blue” as a novel revision rather than a mere retreat. The concert-goers flew to their feet…amid a renewed ovation from the concert hall — Young leaned against the arm of the conductor’s podium with his arms crossed, sporting a boyish Gene Kelly-esque half-smile.
Only true masters can fulfill the musical demands of [Mahler’s Symphony No. 5] and the orchestra and Joseph Young fulfilled them to the highest degree … a special compliment to Joseph Young. This young and very likable conductor is simply great. Here, too, well-deserved cheers, cheers and standing ovations. An unforgettable evening at the Linder Auditorium.
City Press: Mahler meets Makeba as the Mzansi Philharmonic takes the stage in Cape Town
Young led [Mahler’s Symphony No. 5] with wondrous dynamism.
New York Classical Review: NYO2 shows verve and promise
The orchestra opened the Selections from Romeo and Juliet with a terrifically loud introduction to “Montague and Capulet.” The sheer volume of sound, and hearing it both increase and fade, was physically thrilling. The overall performance was terrific. The selections that Young put together were a fine choice, well balanced between light and dark, succinct, and laying out a straight line through the narrative. Inside the music, the orchestra’s playing grew musically deeper and richer with each passing measure.
Seen & Heard International: Celebrating the future at Carnegie Hall with youth, artistry, and energy
The evening got off to a swinging start with Three Dance Episodes from Bernstein’s On the Town. Young is not only a commanding presence on the podium, but he can swing, as well as crouch low to get the players’ attention when he wants things really soft … One of the most exciting moments came when Young sliced the air with both arms eliciting thunderous sounds from the tympani … [a] wondrous celebration of so much talent and such promise.
Diario Libre: Carnegie Hall Youth Orchestra, NYO2, excites with Dominican finale "Caña brava" (Spanish)
It was a magical night with an audience captivated by the chords of NY02, masterfully conducted by the charismatic maestro Joseph Young.
Joseph Young has had quite a year at the Kennedy Center. After a noteworthy Washington National Opera debut in March, the American conductor made an equally fine first appearance with the National Symphony Orchestra this week.
KALW 91.7 FM: How Joseph Young went from teacher to conductor
In this interview, Joseph Young shares his career and how the late Oakland Symphony Conductor Michael Morgan changed his life.
Host Jenee Darden speaks with Joseph Young for this week’s guide to the Bay Area arts scene through the eyes and ears of local artists.
Classical California KUSC: Lara Downes interviews Joseph Young
As part of a concert broadcast, Classical California’s Evening Music Host Lara Downes interviews Joseph Young about a Berkeley Symphony concert program he built around musical friendships. Downes was the featured soloist, playing a concerto by Duke Ellington called New World A-Comin, as well as a work bringing together songs of Billy Strayhorn (arranged by Chris Walden) called A Lovesome Thing: Billy Strayhorn Suite. Also on the program was the effervescent Mariachitlán by composer Juan Pablo Contreras, and Edward Elgar’s Enigma Variations.
Opera (UK): Review of Blue with Washington National Opera
One of the new and, as it turned out, most valuable participants was in the pit. Joseph Young, a dynamic conductor whose career has been primarily orchestra-focused, proved to be a natural for opera, guiding the performance with a deft balance of urgency and subtlety.
Washington Post: In WNO’s belated ‘Blue,’ a powerhouse family portrait of joy and pain
Lively, engaged … well balanced.
SF Classical Voice: Alternative American Stories Energize the Hollywood Bowl
Young got the orchestra snapping out of any hint of the August doldrums.
Cincinnati Business Courier: Cincinnati Opera's lively, thoughtful Fierce finally gets its due
Young led Menefield’s vibrant score with flair, and was alert to every nuance. The musicians performed superbly for him.
Young made a stirring debut as guest conductor with the orchestra in Davies Symphony Hall … Under Young’s robust and fluid leadership, that group provided a full-bodied sound, rich in instrumental color and expressive detail … The most interesting aspect of Young’s arrival was the eloquence of his programming choices … Young and the Symphony musicians delivered… with delectable flair, bursting forth at the emphatic high points and whispering sinuously.
SF Classical Voice: Joseph Young Is Back on the Podium With Berkeley Symphony
For Joseph Young, music director and conductor at Berkeley Symphony, the past year and a half has involved finding new creative outlets like painting, cooking more, and building bookshelves and coffee tables — all the kinds of activities that are normally off the table for busy, traveling musicians. It’s made him ever more grateful for the time that he does spend in front of musicians making music. “I’m the only one [in the orchestra] that makes music that makes no sound,” Young says. The pandemic urged him to try “to navigate around that and … be creative about how to share [his] passion of music to a community that [he didn’t] get to see.”
San Francisco Chronicle: Berkeley Symphony’s terse premiere gives voice to teenage concerns
Berkeley Symphony taps a surprise candidate as its next music director
It was the Berkeley Symphony Orchestra, calling to find out if he was free to step in on just a few days’ notice, fly across the country and conduct a concert as the replacement for an ailing colleague. Young didn’t hesitate. He texted “yes” at the next break, then went back to his rehearsal. The outcome was more than anyone had bargained for.
BMore Art: A Profile of a Young Conductor, Joseph Young
What seems to intrigue him the most is that he conducts people, a thought that fills him with a palpable sense of wonder and responsibility. “I was a shy person, music used to be a protection for me,” he says. “But now, as I’ve grown I’ve realized that I’m conducting this music through people and for me connecting to those people makes the music even better. Having a rapport with your musicians is like that sweet spot in connecting with the audience.”
March 2017 Textile Motifs between lines - Madrid
The Dynamism, elegance and fluency of Joseph Young, a model of technique and gesture, was contagious to the Symphony Orchestra of Radiotelevisión Española…A new opportunity, well taken advantage of by the Maestro to hear normal pages, yes, but in a progammatic environment agreed and intertwined..with exemplary, aesthetic and gestual, commendable naturalness, of the podium.
01/21/2017 RTVE Concert: Traveling in America with Joseph Young
"Joseph Young, current assistant director of the Symphony Orchestra of Atlanta, and that has left A magnificent impression in the Monumental Theater."
"A vibrant reading of the popular symphonic score [Dvorak’s New World Symphony] that demonstrated a great deal of mastery and identification with this music by Joseph Young, showing his perfect knowledge of the work. The rhythmic vigor and vigor of the attacks preponderated in an interpretation that managed to penetrate with great success in the Dvorakian orchestral universe”
10/21/2016 AJC Review: Violinist Joseph Swensen’s focus on orchestra helps ASO soar
Young brilliantly led the symphony through these changes with a deft hand. There’s a lot to keep track of during the piece — interlocking percussion and harp parts must blend perfectly, agile woodwind players have to perform their musical parts with distinction but also blend into the entire orchestra — and Young proved more than capable of perfectly wielding the expanded orchestra.
05/21/2016 Bachtrack Review: Startlingly good Prokofiev: Joseph Young conducts the Atlanta Symphony
"Maestro Young paid close attention to dynamics and the music’s lyricism, imparting a kind of gentle mysteriousness to it...This was a breathtaking performance....Given the great skill he showed in this performance, he should soon be a most sought after conductor.”
05/20/2016 AJC Review: An ASO in mourning excels with Mozart, Prokofiev
"Young shined as a conductor during a sampling of excerpts from Prokofiev’s “Romeo and Juliet” orchestral suites."
06/18/2014 ARTSATL Review: Joseph Young makes ASO debut in concert of students and professionals
If Saturday’s “Firebird” excerpt and reports from Spoleto are any indication, Young will be one to watch from interpretive perspective beyond the mere mechanics of the job — especially, one might wager, for works of the 20th and 21st centuries.
06/03/2014 The New York Times Review:
"But a real emotional high point came in that concert [Spoleto Festival USA Orchestra’s program Concerto for Orchestra conducted by Joseph Young] with a highly charged performance of the Adagio by Samuel Barber, a composer who was close to Spoleto’s founder, Gian Carlo Menotti. It tied together many of the festival’s threads — its personal relationships and conflicts as well as its artistic triumphs — and packed a considerable wallop.”
05/29/2014 Charleston City Paper Review: Charleston native Joseph Young leads a spectacular concert
Maestro Young took the bull by the horns, catching every mood and impulse and driving his musicians nearly to their limits, all the while demonstrating his mastery of the complex score. This was orchestral art at its glittering, ebullient best: an event that most of the fortunate audience will never forget. It’s far and away the finest performance of the work I’ve ever heard in concert."
05/29/2014 Post & Courier Profile: Hometown conductor Joseph Young makes Spoleto Festival debut
05/28/2014 SCETV Podcast: Conductor Joseph Young: Concerto for Orchestra