Marin Alsop lands a London orchestra
OrchestrasAmong a slew ofotherwise routine season announcements today, Marin Alsop is named principal guest conductor of the Philharmonia Orchestra. That’s one workinng title below principal connductor Santtu-Matias Rouvali.
Other titles include Sir John Eliot Gardiner as Principal Guest Conductor Emeritus, Esa-Pekka Salonen as Conductor Laureate and Christoph von Dohnányi, Honorary Conductor for Life.
At the London Philharmonic Orchestra, Composer-in-Residence Tania León will occupy her first season mentoring young composers.
Elsewhere, Munich’s radio orchestra continnues its cycle of early Verdi operas with US tenor Charles Castronovo as artist in residence.
And Welsh National Opera will tour a new staginng of Leonard Bernstein’s Candide.
Excellent news, I am looking forward to seeing her in London.
She just gave a fabulous Sacre with the Phillies at Carnegie Hall. Right up there with MTT and Ozawa (CSO recording). Top stuff.
I heard ponderous tempi and bad balances at that concert.
Good for her.
Good for her? Certainly not good for the musicians.
Good for box office, good for the bottom line, but yes very bad for the Philharmonia musicians. I hope she has learned to study the scores properly, which she singularly failed to do when she was with the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra, the orchestra which gave her her first big opportunity and which is airbrushed by her from her history. Thank goodness the Fort Worth Symphony saved her in the Van Cliburn competition, when she clearly didn’t know Rachmaninov’s Third Concerto. Good luck Philharmonia, enjoy the publicity if not the music.
She knew Rocky 3 well enough last week when she did it with Olga Kern and Baltimore.
Honestly, what is all this hating on Alsop? I’ve seen her many times and she’s never been less than competent. Maybe musicians have a different opinion, but I imagine lots of conductors are perceived differently by musicians than they are by audiences.
Oof – means we’ll be seeing more of her in London… to think I used to buy tickets for the Philharmonia to see Klemperer (well, his last concert), Giulini, Muti, Sinopoli, Salonen
My thoughts exactly. Don’t attend concerts anymore (can’t abide the coughing and the premature applause) but I will always root for the Philharmonia. Great orchestra. Alsop shouldn’t be allowed near it.
Pretty sure that’s their decision, not yours
Not very bright, are you?
I know it isn’t my decision. I was giving my opinion. Look those words up in the dictionary. They don’t mean the same thing.
As with Alsop and the Philharmonia, the next conductor of the LA Philharmonic (and not just its guest one, but its principle) will likely reflect the sociopolitical calculations that increasingly influence the arts and entertainment in the 2020s.
The fine line between merit and politics is a growingly very thin one.
Nonsense. The LA Phil is in many ways at the top of the U.S. orchestra scene now; it’s not really a step up for Dudamel to go to New York – it’s just time for both to have a change after 17 years. They will be sure to find a MD who will work hard to keep them there.
With the previous iteration the Philharmonia appointed two principal guest conductors at the same time, Santtu-Matias Rouvali and Jakub Hrůša, the intention being to promote young and exciting new talents. Whatever your personal opinion of them it certainly did that, with Rouvali of course now chief conductor and Hrůša enjoying an excellent career as well.
It’s sad to see that the Philharmonia seems to be looking more to the past/present than the future with this appointment and the title for John Eliot Gardener.
Fantastic! She deserves it! Yay!
She doesn’t have the utter competence of her predecessors in multiple appointments and her interpretations never scintillate nor are they profound. They’re musical but they never incandescent. That’s the difference between a Kapellmeister and a big leaguer.
Well, good for the Philharmonia but I hope she does not wind up with the principal seat in Chicago.
So, probably does Miss Alsop. In London she has some chance of making a few recordings; in Chicago, none whatsoever.
News to Andrew – the CSO has its own label.
Would that be CSO Resound? Not exactly prolific … Or has it changed its name?
And how many U.S. orchestras are recording prolifically at the moment, Andrew? It’s doing better than most. It probably has just the same number as the BPO has in its label.
And how many U.S. orchestras are exactly pressing out records these days? The CSO has the same number of recordings on its label as the Berlin Philharmonic. At least the CSO has a label. The Philharmonia just has Hollywood.
Ravinia and CSO are different entities. And by tradition, the CSO generally goes after the grandest of grand old (or at least middle-aged) men, and the best athlete available. That’s why my money is on Christian Thielemann.
A posting here about Marin Alsop always guarantees comments from misogynists and jealous male colleagues who feel they were overlooked for the sake of a female candidate. OK, she’s not Toscanini, but she has more talent than many a male conductor. So GROW UP!
You obviously don’t read the anti-Muti comments that come up on the website. It isn’t about women versus men.
A post here about Marin Alsop always guarantees comments from wokesters calling anyone who questions her ability misogynists and jealous. If she can’t be criticized because she’s a woman, let’s just get that out on the table right now.
She gets criticized BECAUSE she’s a woman. As does just about every woman conductor mentioned on SD; I can’t think of one who gets majority approval.
Besides her Roush album with Colorado, I’ve not been impressed with anything she released.
Hopefully she will demonstrate better skills with the Philharmonia than she did with Baltimore.
“Principal guest conductor”…does that position even mean anything significant?
Still gets paid more per week than the musicians make in a year… do we really accept this? For someone who doesn’t live in London? Really?
If Quit Stalin seriously believes what he wrote about concert fees for Ms Alsop as Principal Guest Conductor being greater than the annual salary of the orchestra’s musicians, he’s clearly got little idea of fees in general and must be living on a different planet!
Heaven help us & the Philharmonia- she’s terrible.
Agree with you, Mark. I’d love to know what the fine musicians of the Philharmonia think about her appointment. Nothing against her as a person – largely because I don’t know anything about her. Just don’t rate her musicianship highly. She is competent and no more than that.
Seeing as they are a largely self-governing orchestra – with musicians making up most of the board members – I would imagine they are pleased with the decision.
I congratulate the Philharmonia for adding Maestra Alsop to their ranks. Ever since her time with Bournemouth SO and our own RSNO, Maestra Alsop seems to hit it off with our players something wonderful, so I have high hopes for her tenure – the highest, in fact!
Has she got the balls to program some Maxwell Davies ?
Now that her previous employer, Dame Edna, has left us, it is time for Miss Alsop, her former bridesmaid, paid companion and confidant, to move on to a less stressful occupation, and I wish her every success.
One of the most over-rated of all time.
So many misogynist dude-bros spouting off. Sad.
Try to do better. mmkay?
Reckon you could rewrite that in English?
Karajan, Klemperer, Giulini, Muti, Sinopoli, Salonen…and now Marin. Oh dear.
WHY MENTION Candide now? Booked for that weeks ago!
All these negative comments about Alsop, however if the performance that their new principal, Rouvali gave of Tchaikovsky’s “Francesa da Rimini”
(available on YT) is representative of his talent, then the Philharmonia have made a big mistake with him. Positively the most limp, dull performance of this work that I’ve ever heard. Maybe it was just an off night? Let’s hope so.
Or maybe the musicians are just underworked and underpaid, as they all are in London. Must be nice to sit at the front and wave a stick while everyone else does the heavy lifting, then you earn twice their annual salary with one show
Bahahaha. I guess you don’t know anything about leading a large ensemble. #sonaive
I meant *overworked* and underpaid
I suspect BSO Musicians are hiding behind these thumbs ups and downs, and it’s just dumb. If you were so unhappy playing under her, didn’t like how much $$ she made, etc – why not win another job? Move on? HUH? Why live with all of that negative energy? Let’s see how her successor really does at the BSO at building community/audiences!…also, she should have taken OrchKids with her…too bad.
I attended several BSO/Alsop concerts at Anvil Arts and thoroughly enjoyed them. Their Dvorak 7 stays with me, to this day. It is disheartening to read so much negativity. I, for one, wish her well and look forward to the next International Concert Series. Living in Newbury and having such an incredible array of international orchestras and world class soloists within a 30 minute drive is wonderful (OK, get your thumbs out…)