Philadelphia lands a spare music director

Philadelphia lands a spare music director

main

norman lebrecht

June 05, 2015

Temple University has appointed a new music professor and artistic director, a full-time, year-round job.

He is the German conductor Andreas Delfs, formerly music director of the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra (1997 -2009) and the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra.

It’s highly unusual for an active conductor to move in mid-career to an academic post. Delfs, 55, gets to conducts seven concerts a year with the university orchestra. And he’s available if anyone drops out at the Philadelphia Orch.

delfs

Comments

  • MacroV says:

    I don’t know if this is a sign that his conducting career has sort of run itself out, or if he just didn’t enjoy it anymore and wanted something a bit more stable.

    But as far as I know he’s a terrific musician. I hope it goes well for everyone.

  • Jeffrey Biegel says:

    Andreas is a fabulous musician and conductor. We premiered Lowell Lieberman’s Third Concerto in Milwaukee for three performances. He is equally adept with new music as he is in standard rep. All I can say is the Temple University orchestra is indeed very fortunate. What I see is a trend in our society in universities bringing on seasoned conductors as their guiding light for tomorrow’s orchestral players. Andreas will take them to new heights.

  • Suzanne says:

    The Berlin University of the Arts has made a similar move, appointing Steven Sloane to create and head its new conducting program while continuing a very active international conducting career.

  • Robert Levine says:

    They’re lucky to have him.

  • Alexander Platt says:

    I agree — Bravo to Temple for choosing him, they are most fortunate.

  • william osborne says:

    For excellent music schools, Temple is the best kept secret it the USA. It draws its faculty for orchestral instruments mostly form the Philadelphia Orchestra — basically the same faculty as Curtis. I believe that after one year of residency in Pennsylvania, one can qualify for in-state tuition. For very reasonable prices one can study with some of the best musicians in the country. The major draw back is that it is more-or-less in the midst of one of the worst ghettos in America — though the school does what it can to counter the effects. And that isn’t so unusual. Even Yale is situated next to a terrible ghetto. Check out the amazing faculty roster here:

    http://www.temple.edu/boyer/about/people/faculty.asp

  • Lauren Saunders says:

    Bravo to Temple! Their music program is excellent with a killer jazz band and an orchestra that’s been nominated for 3 Grammy awards. Go Owls.

  • Linda says:

    I disagree with you but agree with one of the comments: Temple was smart enough to get him. End of story.

  • MOST READ TODAY: