Talk:Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra
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History
The Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester was founded in 1986 at the initiative of Claudio Abbado, now its musical director, along with Thomas Angyan and Hans Landesmann in Vienna. In addition to fostering young musical talent and working with young musicians, one of their most important concerns was to promote opportunities for young Austrian musicians to play music together with colleagues from the CSSR at that time and Hungary. The Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester succeeded in being the first international youth orchestra to conduct open auditions in the former East Block countries. Auditions have been conducted since 1986 in the former CSSR, since 1988 in former East Germany, and since 1990 also in the former Soviet Union. The aim of these auditions was and is to provide highly gifted young musicians with valuable orchestra experience working with great conductors outside their home countries. Encouraged by the political development primarily in Eastern Europe as well as by the international success of the orchestra, more and more young musicians from all over Europe soon became interested in the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester. In 1992 the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester was opened to musicians up to the age of 26 from anywhere in Europe. As the pan-European youth orchestra, it is under the patronage of the European Council.
Auditions
At the auditions that take place every year in over twentyfive European cities, a jury authorized by Claudio Abbado makes a selection from among the numerous applicants. Prominent orchestra musicians, for example from the Vienna and Berlin Philharmonic Orchestras, are members of this jury and also supervise the development of the programs in the individual sections during the orchestra's rehearsal phases. Residences
Before the major tours at Easter and in the summer each year, the rehearsal conductor, the teachers and the orchestra musicians meet in one of the residence cities of the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester — Vienna, Bolzano, Paris and Munich — to develop the programs for the tours together. During these working phases, the young musicians gather valuable orchestra experience and also receive important impulses for their further careers. There is no fee for participating in the projects of the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester; with support from its residence cities that contribute to the high costs of accommodations at the rehearsal location, the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester covers all costs occurring in conjunction with the rehearsal phases and the tours. Repertoire
The tour repertoire of the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester ranges from classical music to contemporary music, with an emphasis on the major symphonic works of the romantic and the late romantic era — this is due, not least of all, to the fact that it is a traditional large orchestra with 86 members just in the string section alone. Concerts and Tours
The orchestra's high level of artistic quality and its international success have moved important conductors and soloists to work with the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester: Claudio Abbado, Marc Albrecht, Serge Baudo, Pierre Boulez, Semyon Bychkov, Riccardo Chailly, Peter Eötvös, Iván Fischer, Daniele Gatti, Michael Gielen, Bernard Haitink, Manfred Honeck, Mariss Jansons, Neeme Järvi, James Judd, Sir Neville Marriner, Ingo Metzmacher, Kent Nagano, Václav Neumann, Seiji Ozawa and Franz Welser-Möst have conducted the GMJO since it was founded; the soloists who have worked together with the GMJO so far include Pierre-Laurent Aimard,Thomas Allen, Martha Argerich, Yuri Bashmet, Brigitte Fassbaender, Leon Fleisher, Matthias Goerne, Natalia Gutman, Thomas Hampson, Hans Hotter, Dmitrij Hvorostovskij, Soile Isokoski, Leonidas Kavakos, Simon Keenlyside, Evgenij Kissin, Anna Larsson, Marjana Lipovsek, Radu Lupu, Christa Ludwig, Yo-Yo Ma, Waltraud Meier, Viktoria Mullova, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Jessye Norman, Anne Sofie von Otter, Maria Joao Pires, Lucia Popp, András Schiff, Christian Tetzlaff, Dawn Upshaw, Maxim Vengerov and Frank-Peter Zimmermann. For years, the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester has continuously received invitations from renowned European concert event organizers and festivals, such as the Gesellschaft der Musikfreunde in Vienna, the Wiener Konzerthausgesellschaft, the Cologne Philharmonie, the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, the Salzburg Easter Festival, the Salzburg Festival, the London Proms, the Berliner Festwochen, the Edinburgh Festival, the Schleswig Holstein Music Festival, and the Lucerne Festival, where the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester has been orchestra in residence at the Easter Festival Lucerne from 1999-2003. In recent years, the orchestra has been able to realize several widely acclaimed major projects, such as a European tour with Arnold Schoenberg's Gurre-Liedern conducted by Claudio Abbado (1996), or the Summer Tour 2001 with Gustav Mahler's Symphony No. 8 conducted by Franz Welser-Möst (the first major tour with this work ever), the first opera project conducted by Pierre Boulez and directed by Pina Bausch (Bartók: Herzog Blaubarts Burg, 1998), a major tour through North and South America, in collaboration with the Tanglewood Music Center of the Boston Symphony Orchestra conducted by Claudio Abbado and Seiji Ozawa (1999), and a special concert in Sarajevo in April 1997, the first concert after the war in Bosnia. In summer 2002, the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester performed Wagner's Parsifal conducted by Claudio Abbado and directed by Peter Stein in conjunction with the Edinburgh Festival with great success. The Easter Tour 2003 led the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester to Japan for the first time: directed by Pierre Boulez, the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester performed in Suntory Hall, Tokyo, as well as in Osaka and Nagoya. Gustav Mahler´s Symphony No. 9 was performed under the direction of Claudio Abbado during the Easter Tour 2004, which led the GMJO - before the enlargenment of the European Union - to Budapest, Bratislava, St. Petersburg, Bolzano, Reggio Emilia, Trieste, and Rome. During the Easter Tour 2006, the GMJO performed the symphonic poem Pelleas und Melisande by Arnold Schoenberg and Gustav Mahler´s Symphony No. 4 conducted by Claudio Abbado. Orchestra Academy
At Claudio Abbado's suggestion, the establishment of an orchestra academy was initiated in 1994. This academy obtains scholarships for a limited period for musicians of the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester, to enable the students to concentrate fully on their musical training. In addition, the foundation "Gustav Mahler – Music and Youth" was established in 1999 in Bozen, again at Claudio Abbado's initiative and with Alfred Altenburger as artistic director. The foundation offers various master courses — from chamber music to audition preparation — for scholarship-holders from the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester. Similar projects are planned or have already been established in Ferrera (since 2000), Potenza (since 2005) and Venice. Successes
Former members of the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester are found today in virtually all of the great European orchestras, frequently in first positions — for example with the Wiener Philharmoniker, the Berliner Philharmonisches Orchester, the Staatskapelle Dresden, the Gewandhaus Orchestra Leipzig, the London Symphony Orchestra or the Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam, with opera house orchestras in Zurich, Paris, Barcelona, Helsinki, Rome and Budapest, but also with chamber orchestras such as KREMERata Baltica, the Camerata Salzburg or the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen. The Mahler Chamber Orchestra (MCO), a professional chamber orchestra made up of former members of the GMJO was founded in 1996/97. In addition, there are numerous chamber music associations and ensembles that have been initiated by former members of the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester, from the Clemente Trio and the Vienna Piano Trio to the Miro Ensemble. CD/DVD Releases
Apart from its many TV and radio transmissions, the Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester has realised a number of commercial CD releases, most recently Bruckner´s Symphony No. 8 under Franz Welser-Möst for EMI Classics (2002) and a live recording of the “Wien Modern” Festival under Claudio Abbado for Deutsche Grammophon (released 1997). Salzburg Festival live performances under Claudio Abbado (Mussorgskij: The Night on the Bare Mountain, 1994) and Pierre Boulez (works by Bartók, Boulez and Stravinsky, 1997) have been released for the ORF Festspieldokumente edition. In addition, several live recordings of concerts conducted by Peter Eötvös, James Judd, and Stefan Anton Reck are available on Arte Nova, BMC, and Nuova Era. Gustav Mahler´s Symphony No.9 conducted by Claudio Abbado has been released in December 2004 on DVD for EuroArts.
In autumn 2005 EMI Classics has published the recording of Richard Strauss' Alpine Symphony under the direction of Franz Welser-Möst.
