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Alan Gilbert Conductor

Music Director, New York Philharmonic
Conductor Laureate, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra
Principal Guest Conductor, NDR Symphony Orchestra, Hamburg

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Music Director, New York PhilharmonicConductor Laureate, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic OrchestraPrincipal Guest Conductor, NDR Symphony Orchestra, Hamburg

Alan Gilbert became Music Director of the New York Philharmonic in September 2009, the first native New Yorker to hold the post, ushering in what the New York Times called “an adventurous new era” at the orchestra. In his inaugural season, he introduced several new initiatives, that include two new positions – the Marie-Josée Kravis composer-in-residence, held by Magnus Lindberg and the Mary and James G. Wallach artist-in-residence, to be held in 2010–11 by violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter; an annual three-week festival, this season entitled Hungarian Echoes, led by Esa-Pekka Salonen; and CONTACT!, the New York Philharmonic’s new-music series.

In the 2010–11 season, Gilbert will conduct the New York Philharmonic in a staged presentation of Janáček’s The Cunning Little Vixen, directed by Doug Fitch; Mahler’s Symphonies Nos. 5 and 6 and Kindertotenlieder; the New York premiere of Thomas Adès’s In Seven Days; Mendelssohn’s Elijah; the world premiere of Aaron Jay Kernis’s a Voice, a Messenger (a New York Philharmonic commission);the New York premiere of Magnus Lindberg’s groundbreaking Kraft; and both programs in the orchestra’s CONTACT! series. Gilbert will also lead the orchestra in two tours of European music capitals; two performances at Carnegie Hall, including the venue’s 120th anniversary concert; and his second free Memorial Day Concert at the Cathedral Church of Saint John the Divine, with a program that includes Beethoven’s Symphony No. 3, “Eroica”. He will also play viola with members of the orchestra in a late-season performance of Mozart’s String Quintet in D major, K.59.

In addition to a busy schedule of concerts with the New York Philharmonic this season, Gilbert will conduct several other leading orchestras at home and abroad, including the Philadelphia Orchestra, Hamburg’s NDR Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, and, for the first time, Rome's Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia.

Gilbert studied at Harvard University, the Curtis Institute of Music, and the Juilliard School. From 1995-1997 he was the assistant conductor of the Cleveland Orchestra. In November 2008 he made his acclaimed Metropolitan Opera debut conducting John Adams’s Doctor Atomic. His recording of Prokofiev’s Scythian Suite with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra was nominated for a 2008 Grammy Award, and his recording of Mahler’s Symphony No. 9 received top honors from the Chicago Tribune and Gramophone magazine. On May 15, 2010, the Curtis Institute of Music awarded him an Honorary Doctor of Music degree.

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