Scott Cantrell lists the season’s guest conductors from whom the Dallas Symphony will pick a successor to the departing Jaap van Zweden.
There’s only one American in the frame.
The smart money’s on one of the two Spaniards, Pablo Heras-Casado and Gustavo Gimeno.
Leo Geyer, a doctoral student at Oxford University…
Memo to Peter Gelb: Don’t read the Opera…
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Gotta love this: “But fear not: There will be plenty of standard repertory, too.” Now that’s going bold.
Haven’t seen all these people conduct, but I quite like Hannu Lintu from his Sibelius cycle with the Finnish RSO.
My husband and I can’t wait to find out how this plays out, as we are big fans of the Dallas Symphony! We want you to know that your friends at http://www.pestcontrolfortworth.net/ are big fans with unwavering support!
On the basis of what I have seen/heard on YouTube, I would vote for Heras-Casado, his instinctive intensity is much like Van Zweden’s.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ip1Wxb1hOHg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dfvT0xheCsA
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xgVwbM5fwjQ
Heras-Casado was thankfully passed over in Houston, where he was favored by some (NOT the musicians!). He conducted a truly awful Petrouchka there and was also a poor accompanist. The orchestra ignored him after the first rehearsal. No baton is ok if you can lead, but he certainly did not on that occasion. At one point he yelled at the orchestra for slowing down…..problem was the HE was dragging himself, with no awareness at all.
That’s not good at all, indeed. But other stories tell another tale. Maybe he just did not get on well with the Houstoners, or he had a bad day himself. Maybe his being Spanish played a part in those quarters.
I heard Hannu Lintu a year ago perform Bruckner’s 5th Symphony with the Iceland Symphony Orchestra. To my utter surprise, it was truly the performance of a lifetime and one of the greatest concert experiences I’ve ever had in my life. I’ve heard Bruckner’s 5th performed live by Welser-Most/Cleveland, Ozawa/Boston, Barenboim/Staatskapelle Berlin, and Benjamin Zander/Boston Philharmonic, among others, and BY FAR, Lintu blew them all away and not by a small margin. While the performance was not note-perfect, the conductor and orchestra were so far inside the music that it was mind-blowing and an out-of-body experience.
Hannu Lintu may not be a household name, but based on a very small sample, he’s incredibly talented and put across an astonishing performance of a very difficult symphony to pull off. He’d be at the top of considered candidates from that list.