Jim Hogan had a steady job at Time magazine before he decided to hitchhike around the world with his wife in 1968. They had no plan, just a shared thirst for music of all cultures, which they would follow for five years across four continents.
“The motif that ran through it was music, because we were both musicians,” the 58-year-old said of the adventure.
In recent years, Hogan has spent more time in one place: He’s celebrating his 25th year as executive director of the California Youth Symphony in Palo Alto.
Since Hogan started with CYS, the symphony has expanded from one orchestra of around 100 musicians to several orchestras of more than 500 musicians ages 9 to 18. The symphony now has a senior orchestra, an associate (intermediate) orchestra, and several preparatory groups for beginners. Musicians hail from all over the region, including Mountain View.
“He’s the easiest executive director I’ve gotten to work with, and certainly the most personable,” Leo Eylar, musical director of CYS, said. “He’s enabled me to focus on the music.”
As executive director, Hogan manages every aspect of CYS — except the music. His duties include grant writing, petitioning donors and managing the symphony’s finances.
Born in Chicago, Hogan displayed a love for music as a child, but didn’t learn an instrument himself until some friends introduced him to drums at Northwestern University. In the late 1960s, he met his future wife, Maddie, a like-minded musician earning her degree in music. The two hit it off, and eventually decided to travel in search of more music and culture.
After crossing the United States three times and Central America twice — putting 70,000 miles on their car — the Hogans decided to sell the vehicle and travel overseas.
Working odd jobs, from timber mill worker to music instructor, they made their way from Hawaii to New Zealand to Australia. After landing in Australia, they hitchhiked north and landed jobs at an island resort as a house band. Eventually, they were able to get cheap plane tickets to Bali.
It was in Bali that Hogan discovered the music he still plays to this day, the Indonesian tradition of gamelan. Almost purely rhythmic, gamelan is made up of many cymbals, gongs, and large xylophone-like instruments played together.
When the pair eventually decided to return to America after five years of traveling, they wanted to live in a place where they could continue practicing Southeast Asian music and dance. All their teachers said San Francisco was the only place in America for them.
“It was kind of uncanny,” said Hogan. “They all said, ‘You have to go to San Francisco.'”
After the couple moved there, Hogan met some other musicians who had studied gamelan, and about 26 years ago they decided to form a group of their own. They called it Gamelan Sekar Jaya, the latter part translating to “Flowering Success.” Hogan is still playing with the group now.
A year or so after starting that band, Hogan began working as executive director at the California Youth Symphony.
SIGN-UPS:
The California Youth Symphony Young Artist Competition to select soloists for the 2006-07 season will be held on May 13 at Stanford University. The competition is open to any young instrumentalist 18 years old or younger. The application deadline is April 24. For more information or to download an application form, visit www.cys.org.
