Stoyanovich, Schwarz and Macferran defy gender barrier.

A trio of maestras call Bainbridge home.

If the feminine “a” makes the Italian word for an orchestra’s conductor a little unfamiliar, it’s because women like Sandi Schwarz, Kathleen Macferran and Elizabeth Stoyanovich are still a rare commodity in the music world.

“It’s basically been a man’s bastion,” said Schwarz, who leads the Bainbridge Orchestra in concert this weekend. “In early days they didn’t even have women in orchestras, so of course when men looked for a different conductor, they looked for a man.

“There is still sort of a wall – and of course, you have to be better.”

The classical music world has been slow to welcome women because of conservative nature of the repertoire, Schwarz believes.

“This field is tradition-based,” she said. “We play music that is historic, much of it from the 19th century.”

Schwarz, who grew up in Mexico and came to the U.S. at 18 to study at Oberlin College Conservatory, moved into conducting from being first violin.

Since the first violin – or concertmaster – is “second in command” to the conductor, the step was a natural one.

Macferran, music director of Rainier Chamber Winds who grew up with flute, voice and piano, footnotes her attraction to conducting to an analytical bent and a desire to “see the big picture” – the same qualities that moved her to become certified, recently, as a trainer in the practice of “nonviolent communication.”

“Conducting is a way to combine all the elements,” she said, “because it’s all about partnership. We work together, the musicians and me. The top-down model

doesn’t support the flow of life, the kind of creation that seems meaningful. ”

A memorable instance in which her political and musical aspirations merged, Macferran says, was conducting the Rolling Requiem, the memorial performance of Mozart’s Requiem on Sept. 11, 2002.

Much of the work of conducting, the three maestras agree, happens before the musicians ever play a note, the intense experience Schwarz calls “setting a score,” the business of interpreting the music.

“I’m looking for the shape of the piece,” she said. “I’m looking for the emotion of the piece.”

Even a work that Schwarz has conducted before, like the Mahler she is preparing for this weekend’s concerts, is re-examined.

“I bring to it the experiences that I’ve had since then and my long time as a musician,” she said. “I have a whole new idea of what I want to do with it.”

For islander Stoyanovich, who left California posts as conductor

of education for the Fresno Philharmonic and Assistant Conductor for the Fresno Philharmonic last summer to lead the Bremerton Symphony, the process of interpreting a piece of music may begin as the composition is being written; Stoyanovich’s husband, composer Patrick Stoyanovich, pens music that she has often debuted.

“Usually, when a conductor gets a score, it’s finished,” she said, “but he’ll play snippets of it. If you hear, from the inception, how the harmonies are set, the piece comes to life differently.”

But Stoyanovich says she also enjoys bringing standard works to the 60-piece Bremerton Symphony she now heads.

Stoyanovich notes that her identity as a woman will inform how she moves onstage – the gestures that are key to coaxing the best performance from her musicians.

“Your gestures are controlled by how you are put together,” she said. “Of course I was trained by men, but if you are coordinated, you’ll adapt. And, luckily, the music is fluid.”

When she picks up the baton, Schwarz says she is playing a big instrument with many parts. Although she aspires to conveying as much as possible through body language, with “five things going on at once,” some verbal instruction is also necessary during rehearsal.

With the focus on the performance, gender takes a back seat.

“Then I’m not a woman conductor,” she said. “I’m a conductor.”