Baltimore Symphony Orchestra
Encyclopedia : B : BA : BAL : Baltimore Symphony Orchestra
The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra (BSO) is an American orchestra based in Baltimore, Maryland.
Founded in 1916, The Baltimore Symphony was initially a branch of the municipal government. In 1942 the Orchestra became a private institution.
The music director from 1998 to mid-2006 was Yuri Temirkanov. Other past music directors include Sergiu Comissiona (1969-1985) and David Zinman (1985-1998). In sequence, they transformed the orchestra into one with an international reputation.
In 2005, Marin Alsop was appointed Temirkanov's successor, becoming the first woman in history to lead a major American orchestra. She is scheduled to take over by mid-2006. This created controversy between the board of directors and the orchestra players, the latter feeling their concerns were not addressed in the process of hiring a new music director.
The Baltimore Symphony's main venue is the Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall. Its secondary venue is the Music Center at Strathmore, 50 miles away in Montgomery County, Maryland.
It was the leadership of the Orchestra's Executive Director, John Gidwitz (tenure 1984-2003), that guided the symphony's transformation from a regional company to its modern stature. Despite difficulties in the late-80s with labor relations, the BSO became known as the first American orchestra to tour behind the Iron Curtain (most notably, bringing audiences to their feet with encores of Twist and Shout), and, eventually, one of the better orchestras in the United States. Gidwitz's last iniative was the construction of Strathmore Hall. Accomplished with massive cooperation from the state of Maryland and the Ochestra's board of trustees, it makes the BSO accessible to the wealthy Washington, D.C. suburbs, which had been the National Symphony Orchestra's traditional base.
Music Directors
- 1917-1930 Gustav Strube
- 1930-1935 George Siemonn
- 1935-1937 Ernest Schelling
- 1937-1939 Werner Janssen
- 1939-1942 Howard Barlow
- 1942-1952 Reginald Stewart
- 1952-1959 Massimo Freccia
- 1959-1968 Peter Herman Adler
- 1968-1984 Sergiu Comissiona
- 1985-1998 David Zinman
- 2000-2006 Yuri Temirkanov
- Scheduled to take over September 2007: Marin Alsop
External links
From Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia. Original article here. Support Wikipedia by contributing or donating.
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License See Wikipedia Copyrights for details.