“The Paris Opera announced on Friday morning that Gustavo Dudamel would be its next music director, starting in August for an initial term of six years,” write Zachary Woolfe and Laura Cappelle in Friday’s (4/16) New York Times. The engagement overlaps with Dudamel’s Los Angeles Philharmonic contract as music director, which “runs through the 2025-26 season…. Dudamel made his Teatro alla Scala debut in 2006 … and had his first appearance with the Berlin State Opera the following year. He first conducted at the Vienna State Opera in 2016, and at the Met in 2018, with Verdi’s ‘Otello.’… In Paris … in addition to mainstream repertory, he said he hoped to work with living composers…. In Los Angeles, Dudamel has contributed to the Philharmonic’s robust educational outreach, especially the Youth Orchestra Los Angeles, a program inspired by El Sistema … [Paris Opera Director Alexander] Neef said that alongside Ching-Lien Wu, the company’s recently appointed (and first female) chorus master, Dudamel’s hiring was part of an effort to change the face of the company’s executive ranks and how it thinks about diversity and equity. ‘It’s already what he lives and who he has been in L.A. and other places,’ Neef said.”
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