Fabio Luisi Principal Guest Conductor at the Met
An Insurance Policy for Ailing James Levine?
By: Ariel Petrova - Apr 27, 2010
Fabio Luisi will become Principal Guest Conductor at the Metropolitan Opera, the company’s General Manager Peter Gelb and Music Director James Levine announced today. The Italian maestro, who made his Met debut in 2005 with Don Carlo, will take up the post beginning with the 2010-11 season. So far during the current season, he has conducted Elektra, Le Nozze di Figaro, Hansel and Gretel, and Tosca; he leads the revival of Lulu in May. In the 2010-11 season, the Italian maestro will return for Ariadne auf Naxos and Rigoletto. Luisi is only the second principal guest conductor in Met history, following Valery Gergiev who held the position from 1998 to 2008.
“After brilliantly conducting four different operas this past season (with Lulu still to come), it seemed as though he had already taken on this role, which we are now formalizing with a title,” said Peter Gelb. “Maestro Levine and the orchestra and chorus admire and like him, so it is a natural step.”
“It is a great honor for me to work with the Metropolitan Opera continuously in the coming years,” said Luisi. “Everything in this company meets the highest artistic standards: music staff, chorus, technical department, stage directors, and the Met Orchestra – one of the very best orchestras in the world – with which I enjoy every minute that we make music together.”
James Levine said, “I am thrilled that Fabio Luisi has agreed to join us as principal guest conductor. In the five years since he made his Met debut, he has developed a wonderful rapport with our orchestra and chorus and shown his extraordinary enthusiasm and commitment over a wide range of repertoire. I am looking forward to working with him in maintaining the highest level of artistic quality at the Met.”
Luisi is currently chief conductor of the Vienna Symphony and artistic director of the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo, Japan. He served as general music director of Dresden State Opera and Dresden Staatskapelle Orchestra from 2007 to 2010, artistic director of the MDR Symphony Orchestra in Leipzig from 1999 to 2007, music director of the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande from 1997 to 2002, and chief conductor of the Tonkünstler Orchestra in Vienna from 1995 to 2000. The Genoa native made his Met debut in 2005 with Don Carlo and also conducted the 2007 premiere of a new production of Die Ägyptische Helena, as well as the 2007 revivals of Simon Boccanegra and Turandot. He has appeared with many of the world’s most renowned orchestras and opera companies, including the New York Philharmonic, Orchestre de Paris, Bavarian Radio Orchestra, Vienna Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony, NHK Symphony, Munich Philharmonic, Santa Cecilia Orchestra, Royal Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Vienna State Opera, Bavarian State Opera, Deutsche Oper, and Berlin State Opera. He made his Salzburg Festival debut in 2002, and conducted the Boston Symphony for the first time this past November.