Thursday (3/31) on the WQXR 105.9 FM website, Brian Wise reports, “Dino Anagnost, a conductor who served as music director of The Little Orchestra Society since 1979, died in Manhattan on Thursday after a long illness. His death was confirmed by Joanne Bernstein-Cohen, the executive director of the New York-based orchestra. Anagnost took over the directorship of the 60-member professional chamber orchestra after its founder, conductor Thomas Scherman, died in 1979. Under Anagnost’s direction, the ensemble presented an annual series of concerts at Alice Tully Hall, Zankel Hall and the Cathedral of the Holy Trinity in New York, as well as two longstanding children’s series, ‘Happy Concerts’ and ‘Lolli-pops.’ Anagnost was especially known for building creative and sometimes offbeat programs like ‘Music Takes Flight,’ an aviation-themed concert that ranged from Samuel Barber to Glenn Miller (co-produced with WQXR’s Elliott Forrest); and ‘The Two Annas: Vivaldi’s Muses,’ which looked at the composer’s relationships with young women at an orphanage where he worked. … A Greek-American with an ongoing interest in Greek music, Anagnost founded several choral groups in the 1980s including the Orpheon Chorale and the Metropolitan Singers/The Greek Choral Society, based at Teacher’s College, Columbia University. He was also dean of music at the Greek Orthodox Archdiocesan Cathedral of North and South America on East 74th Street."
Posted April 1, 2011
