With him rests the dreams of remote community that wanted to turn a small group of professional and amateur musicians into "the symphony of the North."
Wallace Leung, 33, is so seriously ill with viral encephalitis, which causes inflammation of the brain, that the musicians he was preparing to take on a tour of northern British Columbia this spring have been told to prepare for the worst -- and to pray for a miracle.
"The seizures have stopped. He is still on life support. It's very, very serious. No one will know until he comes to if there has been brain damage," Jo-Anne Merkel, the orchestra's general manager, said.
"Hopefully, we'll get him back. He could die. There's no doubt about that. That's something we don't want to think about, but it's there.
"The best hope is short-term memory loss."
Mrs. Merkel has been in regular contact with Mr. Leung's family and his fiancée, who lives in New York. Mrs. Merkel is well-briefed on the dangers of viral encephalitis because several of the volunteer musicians in the symphony are doctors. Others are pulp mill workers, students and music teachers, who are supplemented by professional musicians who fly in from Vancouver, Edmonton, Calgary, Toronto and Montreal to billet with local families and play for modest fees in order to support the small town's ambitious orchestra.
Mrs. Merkel said Mr. Leung, a University of British Columbia graduate, was hired last March after coming to Prince George for some guest appearances.
After looking at several candidates, the musicians and fans were asked to vote. Mr. Leung emerged as the most popular with both groups both because of his musical talent and his personal appeal.
"He just reached out to people with his warmth," Mrs. Merkel said. "He's not pretentious. He's just an ordinary Canadian boy," she said. "He liked to play soccer and hockey.
"This is a hockey town and he would go to the games and talk about the symphony. That thrilled people.
"He said if he couldn't go to the Vancouver symphony wearing blue jeans, he wouldn't go. And he let people here know that if you wanted to dress up that was great, but if you wanted to come in jeans, that was great, too.
"One of the things he said he would like to do is to conduct Metallica with the orchestra," said Mrs. Merkel."
Mr. Leung's enthusiasm turned around the symphony, which had been struggling to survive.
"There was excitement in the air. We have gone through some hard times, as all symphonies have, but we were on the rebound with Wallace. People were excited about him and what he was going to do."
Bob Brooks, a violinist who has been with the symphony for more than 20 years, said the orchestra, which has existed in Prince George since about 1970, was in tough shape when Mr. Leung arrived. "Wallace had come at probably one of the lowest points. The economy was down and attendance was down. But the community embraced him. You could see it right away. You could read that in the audience."
People started coming out again. Empty seats began to fill up. During December, the orchestra sold out five shows of The Nutcracker.
Mr. Brooks said the symphony's regular Saturday night performances became the hot ticket in Prince George.
"We get 700 to 800 people out. There's not many empty seats. We could get more if there was room for them," he said.
When musicians heard of Mr. Leung's illness this week they were shattered.
"I was devastated," said Mr. Brooks. "It's an absolute tragedy. People are in shock. The musicians like him so much. And he loved it here. He had a vision of taking the orchestra and making it the orchestra of the North. We had a tour planned for the spring -- all the small towns that seldom see an orchestra. I don't know what's going to happen now."
Mrs. Merkel said a guest conductor is coming in to take over the next performance, Jan. 13, and the symphony is determined to stick to its schedule this year. All the shows will be dedicated to Mr. Leung.
Colin Kinsley, the Mayor of Prince George, said the symphony is a vital part of Prince George's cultural identity and he is praying for Mr. Leung to pull through.
"He's a fellow that has reinvigorated the symphony," he said. "We've had challenges [keeping the symphony alive], but Wallace rejuvenated the interest in the community with his style and his hard work."
Mr. Kinsley said the symphony has put on some "absolutely fabulous" performances recently, and the community has been buzzing with interest. "It's a wonderful orchestra," he said.
Mr. Kinsley said people who aren't familiar with Prince George, a lumber industry centre of about 87,000 located on the Fraser River in north-central B.C., are often surprised when they hear the town has a symphony.
"It's wonderful to have the orchestra here. Its value -- you can't really measure it."
He said the orchestra's presence helps the city in recruiting medical professionals and academics who might otherwise write off the town as a cultural backwater. And it provides a sophisticated counterpoint to the rough edges of a small, northern community.
Ruth Rushant was one of the symphony's first directors. She said it started 30 years ago "with about half a dozen people getting together and just starting to play."
It went through good times and bad, but somehow always survived.
Under Mr. Leung's direction, she said, it was thriving. The Prince George Symphony Orchestra has a core group of about 15 musicians, swelling to between 35 and 55 depending on the show it is putting on.
"We don't have 105, as Toronto and Montreal do, so we have to play twice as hard to fill out the sound," Mr. Brooks said. "It works, too."
The orchestra opened its season this fall with a performance of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony, which Mr. Leung dedicated to the victims of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
At the time Mr. Leung, whose fiancée used to work in the World Trade Center, said: "I feel thankful to have this opportunity to make music and share it with people. For us, music is part of the grieving and healing process."