Randall Craig Fleischer

Randall Craig Fleischer is no stranger to assembling concert programs, selecting works that complement and contrast with one another and arranging them in a way that has an arc and a flow.

The program he’s assembling for Aug. 22 requires a different skill set as he prepares to host the Youngstown Symphony Society’s first livestream gala.

“All of the sudden I’m in the video production business,” he said during a telephone interview from his home in Los Angeles. “I had to purchase and learn how to use video editing software. It’s tricky.”

Instead of using a baton to coax the best performance out of the musicians, Fleischer honed his interview skills to coax the best responses from a guest list that will include Jodi Benson, best known as the voice of Ariel in the animated Disney classic “The Little Mermaid”; Dee Snider, lead singer of the band Twisted Sister who toured as a vocalist in Fleischer’s “Rocktopia”; Mairead Nesbitt, one of the founding members of Celtic Woman and another Rocktopia veteran; and Youngstown native Phil Keaggy, a Dove Award-winning Christian artist and a member of the band Glass Harp.

“I watched old Phil Donahue interviews, old Oprah interviews and old Johnny Carson interviews, people who were recognized as really brilliant at the task,” Fleischer said. “I looked to see if they wrote anything about their interview technique.

“I’ll say this, it was a heck of a lot of fun. It always got kind of silly. I think people will find it fascinating. You see these performers on stage, and they almost seem like gods. They are real people, and having them talk about moments in their careers when they were nervous or intimidated or this and that, it humanizes them.”

The event also will feature jazz musician and composer Chris Brubeck, Step Afrika founder and choreographer Brian Williams, opera singer Kishna Davis-Fowler and classical musicians Zuill Bailey, cello, and Carol Wincenc, flute.

“I think there will be some surprises, some harrowing stories of last-minute changes and under-rehearsed projects and, ‘Oh, my God, how am I going to get through this?’ moments from almost every single artist. You’ll get an extremely entertaining glimpse at the backstage drama that goes on and how dicey it can be before that moment we go on stage and start the magic … It will be entertaining for anyone who loves music of any genre.”

Interspersed with the interviews will be a cooking demonstration by Dr. Y.T. Chiu and recorded performances by members of the orchestra, some from past performances and others recorded specifically for the livestream gala.

“Being a union orchestra, there are very strict restrictions about what we can and can’t do in terms of video,” Fleischer said. “Some of that was usable, and I sent out a request to the musicians, ‘Can you go somewhere beautiful and video yourself playing something?”

The event also will serve as the start of an online auction that will run through Aug. 26 and feature vacation packages, wines and spirits, artwork and a guitar played by Keaggy on his “Find Me in These Fields” album.

The gala was created to provide entertainment for the orchestra’s supporters, but more importantly it will provide money to support an arts organization that has been sidelined since March due to the COVID-19 pandemic. There is no charge to watch the livestream through YSO’s social media accounts, but a GoFundMe account has been set up online where viewers can make donations to the orchestra.

“Financially, it’s tough,” Fleischer said. “The way we make money is to sell tickets, not only to our own events but to producers and presenters in Youngstown who choose to rent our facility, but even those are about live performance.”

It’s also been challenging creatively.

“I got my first real, full-time conducting job in 1989, and this is by far the longest period in my life I’ve gone without conducting something,” he said.

Being with his wife and daughter in Los Angeles, Fleischer admitted he has it better than most. But like most people in his profession,”There is an aching inside in a most profound way not having the opportunity to make music.”