“Alan Gilbert, the departing music director of the New York Philharmonic, announced Friday that he would be the next chief conductor of the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra, whose striking new $843 million concert hall overlooking Hamburg’s harbor opened earlier this year,” writes Michael Cooper in Friday’s (6/23) New York Times. “Mr. Gilbert is … moving to a city whose gleaming new concert hall has been capturing the imagination of audiences. And he is returning to musicians who know him well: Mr. Gilbert was the ensemble’s principal guest conductor from 2004 to 2015, when it was known as the NDR Symphony Orchestra…. Mr. Gilbert [recently] spoke of his admiration for the way the Elbphilharmonie had worked to build a relationship with its audience before the hall opened…. Hamburg has been making a big investment in music, and officials there said that they were pleased to have landed a musician of Mr. Gilbert’s stature—and one with clear ideas about innovation. ‘His vision for a 21st-century orchestra is a perfect fit for the Elbphilharmonie,’ Christoph Lieben-Seutter, the general and artistic director of the Elbphilharmonie, said in a statement. Mr. Gilbert agreed to a five-year contract, beginning in the 2019-20 season.”
Posted June 23, 2017
Alan Gilbert inset photo by David Finlayson
