It's now down to three finalists for the job of Bismarck-Mandan Symphony orchestra conductor.

The three are Beverly Everett, conductor of the Bemidji Symphony Orchestra in Minnesota; Travis Hatton, music director of the Sunnyside Symphony Orchestra and Chorus in Portland, Ore; and Jason Love, music director of the Columbia Orchestra in Columbia, Md.

But narrowing three to one is still about eight months away, said Karen daSilva, the symphony's operations manager.

A final decision on who will lead the symphony, which has been without a full-time conductor since Tom Wellin's 2005 resignation, will come after the three finalists each plan a concert and conduct it during the symphony's 2007-08 season.

An initial pool of about 80 applicants was cut to 17, then to five applicants this spring by a search committee.

The five, interviewed in late May and early June - three in person and two by telephone - were so impressive that it wasn't until she and committee members saw DVDs of the five conducting that they recently were able to get the number down to the final three, daSilva said.

"It was really, really hard,"she said.

She said the committee watched for, among many other things, the conductors' basic abilities when it came to cuing musicians - watching them for "clean entrances, definite beats."

Love, who is on tour in Europe and couldn't be reached for an interview, has been conductor of the Columbia Orchestra in Maryland since 1999. He also is artistic director for the Greater Baltimore Youth Orchestras and is a conducting teacher at the University of Maryland in Baltimore. Love received a bachelor's degree in violoncello performance in 1992 and a master's degree in conducting in 1994 from the Peabody Institute of the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore.

The Tribune was able to reach the other two finalists recently, who both said they've achieved what they have because of many hours of hard work.

Everett, who grew up in Waxahachie, Texas - with two sisters, a dad in air conditioning sales who wasn't a musician, and a mom involved in church choirs - decided at age 6 to learn to play the piano.

She would end up going to Baylor University in Texas on a scholarship because of her organ skills and was focusing on studying organ performance until, by accident, she ended up taking an orchestral conducting class. To accommodate a large number of students who wanted to take a choral conducting class, the class was divided - for the first half of the semester, she and some other students were sent to study another type of conducting, orchestral conducting.

She said during the orchestral conducting half of the semester, she realized that's what she wanted to do, but she was afraid no one would take her seriously.

"I'd never had anything to do with orchestra. I thought you had to play the cello or a stringed instrument."

So she decided to work exceptionally hard on assignments, and one day her professor brought her into his office to tell her that in a few weeks she had gone from being the worst to the best in the class.

Everett said she liked conducting because she could interact with people instead of spending four to eight hours a day alone practicing the organ.

"(Studying the organ) was fulfilling, but I wanted something more than that,"she said.

A concertgoer came up to Everett in Bemidji recently and told her she used to attend the Bemidji orchestra to "'make the orchestra feel better,' now she comes to make herself feel better," Everett related.

Everett said the orchestra has had problems in the past with low attendance and quality of performance. But in the two years she has been there, "with the support of the Bemidji community musicians and board, we have increased ticket sales, attendance and budget by over 50 percent."

Everett said she has a main goal when she conducts.

She said she has often gone to listen to a well-known orchestra and found that the pieces are done well, but mechanically, "you won't be moved."

"You won't have the physical experience, the tug at the chest, tears in your eyes or that feeling in the center of the chest,"she said.

It sounds good, the right rhythms, "but it's what's beyond that that really reaches people."

Then she'll go to a smaller orchestra, which is playing a piece that would seem totally beyond what the musicians should be capable of, and it happens:"They get it. It's so moving, so inspiring,"she said. "That's what I'm after as a musician."

Everett said the American Symphony Orchestra League put on a forum for female conductors; 11 participated, and five kept in contact and decided to form an association to continue providing a support system for female conductors.

She said she likes to go for walks, read, or watch DVDs of her favorite television show, "West Wing,"which she thinks has taught her things about leadership. She's so sure of that that she sent a letter to actor Martin Sheen, who wrote back.

She said Bismarck is a bigger orchestra, a bigger organization, and she was in Bismarck last fall judging a statewide string festival and was "very, very impressed with the talent" and taken with the people here.

"Bismarck is an attractive community for a musician,"she said.

Hatton, the other finalist, also attributes his musical successes to long hours of hard work.

"I'm a pretty average kind of guy,"said Hatton, conductor of community orchestras in the Portland area.

Hatton, who spent about five years conducting overseas in the Czech Republic and won an international conducting competition there in 1991, said he remembers studying music theory and composition about four to five hours a night in college. He said that, when he was 21, he spent six months studying an about 12-minute Beethoven piece - the first movement of Beethoven's Symphony No. 3.

"I remember when Igot to the end of that, my confidence level was high,"he said in a phone interview. "I felt I could stand in front of any orchestra and conduct that piece. I knew every note."

Hatton, who graduated magna cum laude in music theory-composition at the University of the Pacific in Stockton, Calif., went on to get graduate degrees at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston and from Ball State University in Muncie, Ind.

Hatton also works as director of orchestras for a private Catholic school in Beaverton, Ore., and as director of the Vancouver Children's Opera and First Baptist Church in Portland.

He said it was about six months ago he received what he thinks was the greatest praise.

"I'm still kind of giddy about it," he said.

Aformer music student, not a music major, who is now out of college and working for a land-use department, caught up with him about six months ago to tell him that it was the two years she spent studying with him that made her a lifelong musician.

He said he's so happy about that because such a tiny percentage of the adult population still plays an instrument. He said he wishes he had a dollar for every time someone has told him "they used to play" and wishes they still did.

Hatton, married and father of two elementary-school-aged children, is interested in leaving behind his two-hour-a-day commute, establishing his family in a small town and being at the helm of a the flagship in Bismarck instead of one of a half-dozen community orchestras in Portland.

"Drive 20 minutes down the freeway, and you're in another orchestra's turf,"he said and laughed.

Hatton, who grew up in Stockton, said he began to play the French horn in fourth grade. However, he had aspirations of playing major league baseball. Then in about eighth grade, his interest in music took over. He said he lucked out by having three years of music theory in high school, which gave him a head start in college music theory classes.

Everett will be the first finalist put to the podium test.

The concert schedule: Oct. 19, Everett; Nov. 17, Hatton; and Feb. 9, Love.

Audience members at the concerts will have an opportunity to share their opinions about each finalist's performance by filling out survey inserts in their programs.

"This way people can be involved in who's picked," daSilva said.

She said the search committee probably will make a final decision perhaps two to three weeks after Love's February concert.

The committee members are daSilva; Rick Spratt, symphony board president; Margaret Fiechtner, vice president; symphony musicians Signe Snortland and Tonya Mertz; music instructors John Darling of Bismarck State College and Michelle Kiec of University of Mary; and Sally Dasinger, the symphony's personnel coordinator.

(Reach reporter Virginia Grantier at 250-8254 or at virginia.grantier@;bismarcktribune.com.)