Just in: HK Philharmonic chief quits
OrchestrasIt has just been announced that Benedikt Fohr, Chief Executive of the HK Phil since April 2019, will leave next July.
Fohr, 60, was previously head of the Deutsche Radio Philharmonie Saarbrücken Kaiserslautern.
He recently signed the young Finn Tarmo Peltokoski as HK’s next music director, starting mid-2026.
I know no more than anyone else but it does seem possible that there could be one of three reasons.
1. Another position opening up in Europe for which he has been head hunted, although nine months notice is pretty long.
2. Disappointment with the recent MD appointment. After all, was he not quoted earlier in the year expressing his disappointment that another more established international conductor had turned down the MD job?
3. Local politics including major disappointment that the massively delayed and vastly over-budget West Kowloon Cultural District still has no new concert hall planned to replace the desperately poor one in the HK Cultural Centre. The HK Phil really needs a hall with much better acoustics and facilities to call its own.
I hated the Cultural Centre. I lived in HK when it opened, and had a hard hat tour. I couldn’t believe a venue on that harbour was built without windows. And for serious arts performances — dance and music — I vastly preferred the HKAPA.