Alondra is out of Australia
mainThe three-year Queensland Symphony contract of Alondra de la Parra will not be renewed at the end of this season.
That leaves four Australian orchestras out of six in search of a music director.
Andrew Davis has stepped down in Melbourne, David Robertson has given up in Sydney and Nicholas Carter is moving on from Adelaide.
Australia’s looking for four new captains.
Simone Young would be the most logical choice in either Sydney or Melbourne.
Simone is a first class conductor and the genuine article.
Indeed, if for whatever reason they MUST have a woman Simone Young is the best option. I think they should have the best conductor available, regardless of their sex, but that doesn’t seem the current way.
You are not exactly on the pulse with this news. It has been known publicly since the start of the year that she wasn’t going to stay on.
The Brisbane News lifestyle magazine ran an interview/profile piece all the way back in February in which it was made clear that it was her final season. Cover story of the magazine and republished by the Courier Mail.
Sir Andrew Davis has been fantastic at the helm of the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra over the last seven years. I very much doubt the MSO will secure the services of a Chief Conductor of his calibre again. Simone Young has been mooted as a possible choice. Please, no.
Young would be ok. Even better would be regular visitor Jakub Hrusa – it would be worth paying whatever it takes to get him. Other recent frequent guests (an indicator of possible candidacy) include Morlot and Kochanovsky.
The MSO tried for Jakob Hrusa but he was just too fully committed in Europe to take it on. He would have been superb, as witness his guest concerts. [Not even coming as a guest in 2020 …]
Yes, Hrusa would be awesome! I’ve attended his concerts in Melbourne as guest conductor and he was brilliant. His performance of Suk’s ‘Asrael’ Symphony a couple of years ago was the best I’ve ever heard.
Of course they are not renewing her. She’s just a fashion product and an awful conductor. Someone cool to have on the stage, something new (a woman)…. but there is a momment when coolness cannot stay in the way of reality: she is a terrible conductor.
I know absolutely nothing about her work but haven’t heard anything like that said about her before.
You’ve attended her concerts have you?
She used to conduct a festival in Vermont. I didn’t think she was terrible. There was some criticism of her from some people in Queensland saying she was contributing to a toxic culture:
“But one former staff member told Daily Review that the “revolving door” at QSO was because of “extremely ineffectual leadership” of both Pratt and De la Parra when she is in the country.”
https://dailyreview.com.au/queensland-symphony-staff-churn-prompts-claims-toxic-work-culture/68193/
It’s not like she was there much anyway… Hopefully they find someone who is interested in them and dedicates them the adequate time.
And she pulled out of QSO’s season opening concert in February, as well as the next QSO mainstage concert on Sept 12th – both concerts featuring the orchestra’s Artist-in-Residence Paul Lewis on piano. Subscribers and orchestra alike have had enough of this woman’s unprofessionalism. And we won’t even mention the conducting….
Good gracious, Paul Lewis??? Absolutely unforgivable. This woman is a complete disgrace!
It isn’t as dire as you make it sound. Aussie orchestra are attracting top notch conductors.
I know, they can even afford to turn down talent like Alondra in Brisbane.
Alondra de la Parra is clearly one of the biggest jokes and a real dilettante in the music business. She was also fired from her previous job in Guadalajara.
Whatever she does with her very rich family’s money, political connections through her previous marriage to the son of former Mexican President and the relentless push of her agent Tanja Dorn, they are all meaningless. Every orchestras find out very quickly that she absolutely has no ability to be a Music Director of an orchestra and all those gesticulations, face expressions on stage are nothing but fake!
And this was evident when she started her “career” using young non-union NYC musicians in concerts in which they were woefully underpaid.
Bravissimo!!! Absolutely spot on.
I’m sure they’ll find good conductors. Who wouldn’t want to spend a couple months every year in Melbourne, Sydney, or Brisbane, even with the travel it involves? And fine orchestras they are.
Brisbane? That might be a struggle. A long way from anywhere and not particularly much to do if you are “cultured”. (It is great if you like sport and the beach, and are not particularly intellectual.)
But, but, she’s a WOMAN! And also a Woman of Color! A two-fer. She and other underrepresented ethnics are the future of classic music, that bastion of dead white male composers and dying middle-age whites. They represent relevancy and inclusion! Alas, pretty face with pretty dress in empty shell succumbs to the curmudgeons of classical music.
There is real truth in your comments, though the last sentence was dodgy. The facts are that these days there are fewer and fewer ‘white’ males; inter-racial relationships are increasingly to be found in our multicultural societies, so it’s a complete falsehood to talk about ‘whiteness’ as some kind of privilege. But that would require a bit of thinking about. It doesn’t roll so easily off the tongue if the truth is understood.
Right now the worst thing that can have to an aspiring conductor is to be a white european heterosexual cisgender male. That is very ‘uncool’ right now.
I have to agree with the above comments … she is awful.
Is she narrating Peter and the Wolf?
She allegedly has a reputation for not only being a horrible conductor but for being a horrible person, too. A friend played under her once (she made it clear through her demeanor that they were ALL “under” her) and when it became obvious that the players knew the score better than she did, she started bullying and mocking people in rehearsal. She apparently even didn’t know NOT to conduct/phrase during the soloist’s slow movement solo (as in no orchestral accompaniment for a LONG time).
Worst experience ever by all accounts.
Not sure that being “under” her would be such a bad thing.
Playing under her? Whole different story.
She’s hot and easy on the eyes but isn’t much of a conductor.
All the misogynists in this comment section are amusing!
…JK
So, everyone not praising AslP are misogynist? Including me, a woman and a professional violinist?
Of course someone would eventually come here with this “it’s all misogyny!” bullshit. As if no woman in this planet could be criticized, ever! Even in a case like that, where the person in question is dreadful in what she does.
But but but but… she’s a WOMAN!