The age of 7 was a big year for Cynthia Woods. That’s when she realized that the violin was the most beautiful instrument she had ever heard. It was also when the Wisconsin native got to take part in a music clinic-similar to the Greater Boston Youth Symphony Orchestra program- at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. It was there she first picked up a baton.

Named music director and conductor of the Cambridge Symphony Orchestra in 2006, Woods says, “Conducting is like being a coach of a big team. It’s a lot of bringing together of forces. The rush is seeing something come together very quickly. And you’re at the focal point, with everything swirling around you.”

She leads the orchestra at a free pops concert on Sunday on the lawn of Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government.

“A lot of conductors just cringe at the term ‘pops concert’ “she says. “But it’s fun music. We’ll be doing highlights from Wicked and we’ll be doing Star Wars and some Harry Potter tunes and Sousa marches. It’s a concert where everyone can let their hair down and relax a bit.”

Woods wants to make it clear that she loves music by Mahler and Beethoven which is reflected in her regular season programming, “but I also think there’s a place where we go out into the community and play tunes that people know, perhaps on instruments that they’re not familiar with. The kids hear these tunes in the movies, but don’t realize that an orchestra plays them, and they have a great time. Last year when we did this, I think we played Sousa’s Washington Post march about 20 times because we let the kids come up and wave their hands and conduct the orchestra”.

When she chooses a season, she likes to add something new to go with the classics.

“Usually we’ve done one major contemporary thing every year,” she says. “Last year was John Corigliano’s Symphony No.1, “and the year before was Joan Tower’s Concerto for Violin, and we got a standing ovation for both of them. We were pushed to our technical limits, but I think we grew as a group. It also challenged our audience but I think they appreciated it

“I think we have a discriminating audience, and a supportive audience,” she adds.

Ed Symkus, Cambridge Chronicle