“Technically, Xian Zhang’s tenure as the first female Music Director of the New Jersey Symphony Orchestra doesn’t begin until later this year,” writes James C. Taylor in Sunday’s (4/3) Star Ledger (N.J.). “But this week’s concerts mark the Chinese-born conductor’s first appearance with the orchestra since the announcement of her appointment last year…. ‘I look forward very much to seeing the musicians again,’ she said last week, in a telephone interview from Milan, where she has been music director of the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano Giuseppe Verdi since 2009…. Zhang and the orchestra will be playing … two Tchaikovsky works (both his ‘Marche Slave’ and dramatic 4th symphony) with Samuel Barber’s Violin Concerto. Zhang says, … ‘It will be very romantic in nature.’ … After this week’s concerts, Zhang returns to Europe for engagements in Madrid, Amsterdam, then back to Milan. In May, she will tour China. After that, she hopes to find a home in New Jersey for her family—she and her husband Yang Lei have two sons. Her four-year contract with NJSO begins in September…. For now her plans are to expand the audience and make deeper connections throughout New Jersey.”
Posted April 4, 2016
