Alan Gilbert - New York Philharmonic, Conductor and Music Director Designate

Photo Credit: Chris Lee

New York-born conductor Alan Gilbert will become Music Director of the New York Philharmonic in the 2009–10 season. He has been chief conductor and artistic advisor of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra since 2000 and principal guest conductor of Hamburg’s NDR Symphony Orchestra since 2004. He began the current season with his

Vienna Staatsoper debut, conducting Bizet’s Carmen, and has launched his final season in Stockholm.

This season Mr. Gilbert appears with The Philadelphia Orchestra at its home at the Kimmel Center, and takes the orchestra of his alma mater — Philadelphia’s Curtis Institute of Music — to Carnegie Hall. He gives concerts with the San Francisco Symphony, and in Zurich will conduct the Tonhalle Orchestra and as well as returning to the Zurich Opera House. In Paris he will lead concerts with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France; and with Hamburg’s NDR Symphony Orchestra (NDRSO) he conducts the final concerts of the 2007 Schleswig-Holstein Festival as well as several series of subscription performances in Hamburg, Lübeck, and Bremen. He also takes the NDRSO on tour to Cologne, Vienna, Prague, and Ljubljana, Slovenia.

Alan Gilbert regularly conducts other leading orchestras in the U.S. and abroad, including the Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, and Chicago symphony orchestras; The Cleveland Orchestra; Munich’s Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Amsterdam’s Royal Concertgebouw, Orchestre National de Lyon, and Mahler Chamber Orchestra.

Mr. Gilbert’s parents, both violinists in the New York Philharmonic (his father is now retired), were his first teachers. Born and raised in New York City, he studied at Harvard University, The Curtis Institute, and The Juilliard School, and was a substitute violinist with The Philadelphia Orchestra for two seasons, and assistant conductor of The Cleveland Orchestra from 1995 to 1997. Mr. Gilbert was honored with the 1997 Seaver/ National Endowment for the Arts Conductors Award, and was named a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Music, one of the country’s oldest musical institutions. He last appeared with the New York Philharmonic in February and March 2007. Upcoming are concerts March 5–7, 2008 with the Philharmonic, featuring works by Haydn, Berio, and Beethoven; a Rush Hour Concert on March 12, 2008; two Hear & Now concerts March 13 and 14; and an Inside the Music program on March 14.