In Tuesday’s (12/10) New York Times, Robin Pogrebin reports, “Deborah F. Rutter, who as president of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra helped it navigate the financial shoals that have sunk other orchestras, will become the president of the Kennedy Center next fall, the center announced on Tuesday. Ms. Rutter, 57, will succeed Michael M. Kaiser, who, after 13 years as president, is leaving in September.… Ms. Rutter will be the first female president of the center, which opened in 1971.… As the artistic and administrative director of the Kennedy Center, Ms. Rutter will oversee theater, dance, ballet, chamber music and jazz, as well as the center’s affiliates, the National Symphony Orchestra and Washington National Opera.… At the Chicago Symphony, Ms. Rutter earned admiration in the classical music world for recruiting [Riccardo] Muti to replace Daniel Barenboim as the orchestra’s music director.… ‘Music directors of his caliber have a lot of choice in terms of where they go,’ said Jesse Rosen, president and chief executive of the League of American Orchestras, ‘and she was able to reel him in.’ ” Under Rutter’s leadership, the Chicago Symphony in 2011 “established the Citizen Musician initiative, which uses music as a form of public service.”
Posted December 11, 2013
Photo of Deborah Rutter by Todd Rosenberg
