Franz Welser-Möst

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Franz Welser-Möst (born 16 August 1960) is an Austrian conductor.

Contents

[edit] Biography

Franz Leopold Maria Möst was born in Linz, Austria and later studied under the composer Balduin Sulzer. In 1985 he assumed the stage name Welser-Möst on suggestion of his mentor, Baron Andreas von Bennigsen of Liechtenstein, thus paying homage to the city of Wels where he grew up.[1][2] In 1986 he was adopted by von Bennigsen whose former wife, Angelika, he married in 1992.[3][4][5] His first major debuts were at the Salzburg Festival in 1985, followed by the London Philharmonic Orchestra in 1986. Other guest conductor appearances comprised the first five years of his career: his American debut with the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra in 1989, performances with the orchestras of Atlanta, Boston, New York, Chicago, plus frequent returns to the London Philharmonic. In 1990, Welser-Möst became principal conductor of the London Philharmonic Orchestra (LPO).[6] His LPO tenure was controversial, with London critics giving him the nickname "Frankly Worse than Most".[3] He concluded his LPO tenure in 1996.

From 1995 to 2000, he was music director with the Zurich Opera House. While there, he led 27 new performances as well as numerous revivals. His most noteworthy performances there included the complete Ring Cycle. He became general music director of the Zurich Opera in September 2005, making a commitment to the Opera that had been scheduled through 2011. Instead, Welser-Möst is scheduled to give up the Zurich post in July 2008.

Welser-Möst became music director of The Cleveland Orchestra with the 2002–2003 season, for an initial contract of 5 years. At the end of his first season, his contract was extended for another 5 years. In June 2008, the orchestra announced a further extension of his contract with The Cleveland Orchestra through the 2017–2018 season.[7] [8] The Cleveland Plain Dealer regularly reviews his performances as does the Akron Beacon Journal. His direction of choral works has been singled out as excellent, with some reservations expressed about other orchestral elements. A lengthy February 2005 article in The New Yorker profiled the conductor and his orchestra and gave both high praise.

On June 6, 2007, the Austrian government announced the appointment of Welser-Möst as Musical Director (Generalmusikdirektor) of the Vienna State Opera beginning in September 2010, alongside Dominique Meyer as director (Staatsoperndirektor).[9][10] Welser-Möst had debuted at the Staatsoper in 1987 taking over from Claudio Abbado Gioachino Rossini's l'Italiana in Algeri. It took more than 10 years for Welser-Möst to return to the State Opera where he conducted Richard Wagner's Tristan und Isolde. In December 2006 he led his first new production in Vienna, Richard Strauss' Arabella. Welser-Möst is also scheduled to conduct the Staatsoper's next production of Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen in 2007–08 and 2008–09.[citation needed] In 2009–10 he is to conduct a new production of Wagner's Tannhäuser.[citation needed]

[edit] Recordings

From the start of his career Welser-Möst has heavily emphasized the importance of recording his work. While conducting the LPO he established an exclusive recording contract with EMI. This move produced several great successes and awards. His 1996 recording of Franz Schmidt's Symphony No. 4 received the Gramophone Award for Best Orchestral Conducting. The CDs of Anton Bruckner's Mass No. 3 Te Deum and works of Erich Korngold both received Grammy Award nominations for "Best Classical Album." Welser-Möst struck a similar deal with EMI to record various performances at the Zurich Opera, but EMI's support for Welser-Möst has noticeably waned. EMI has neither produced nor released any recordings since Welser-Möst assumed the helm of The Cleveland Orchestra, and many of his earlier recordings have been deleted from the catalog. In October of 2007, Deutsche Grammophon released the first commercial recording featuring The Cleveland Orchestra with Welser-Möst: a Beethoven's Symphony No. 9 with the high-profile German bass Rene Pape.[11]

[edit] References

  1. ^ "Was glauben Sie?" – Der Dirigent Franz Welser-Möst (German). ORF Religion (25 February 2006). Retrieved on 2007-09-04.
  2. ^ "Der Auslandsösterreicher des Jahres 2001–Franz Welser-Möst" (.PDF), ROTWEISSROT, Auslandsösterreicher-Weltbund, January 2003. Retrieved on 2007-09-04. (German) 
  3. ^ a b Lebrecht, Norman. "Franz Welser-Möst — The conductor they loved to hate", La Scena Musicale, 12 February 2004. Retrieved on 2007-09-04. 
  4. ^ Lebrecht, Norman. "He might be smiling now… — Franz Welser-Möst Returns to Conduct the Proms", La Scena Musicale, 16 August 2000. Retrieved on 2007-09-04. 
  5. ^ Naredi-Rainer, Ernst. "Schwierige Annäherung an Wien", NEUE Vorarlberger Tageszeitung, 27 June 2006. Retrieved on 2007-09-04. (German) 
  6. ^ Nicholas Kenyon. "A Young Conductor Starts at the Top", New York Times, 15 March 1992. Retrieved on 2007-11-03. 
  7. ^ Donald Rosenberg and Zachary Lewis. "Cleveland Orchestra extends Welser-Most's contract until 2018, plans staged operas", Cleveland Plain Dealer, 6 June 2008. Retrieved on 2008-06-07. 
  8. ^ James R. Oestreich. "Cleveland Orchestra Extends Music Director’s Contract", New York Times, 7 June 2008. Retrieved on 2008-06-07. 
  9. ^ Pelinka, Nikolaus (6 June 2007). Kulturministerin Claudia Schmied: "Dominique Meyer wird 2010 Direktor der Wiener Staatsoper" (German). Bundesministerium für Unterricht, Kunst und Kultur. Retrieved on 2007-09-04.
  10. ^ Westphal, Matthew. "Vienna State Opera Appoints Dominique Meyer Its Next Director, with Franz Welser-Möst as Music Director", Playbill Arts, 6 June 2007. Retrieved on 2007-07-16. 
  11. ^ Tsioulcas, Anastasia. "Cleveland Orchestra partners with DG", The Gramophone, 6 March 2007. Retrieved on 2007-09-04. 
  • Rosenberg, Donald (2000). The Cleveland Orchestra Story. Cleveland: Gray & Company. ISBN 1886228248. 

[edit] External links

v • d • e
London Philharmonic Orchestra Principal Conductors

Thomas Beecham (1932) · Eduard van Beinum (1947) · Adrian Boult (1950) · William Steinberg (1958) · John Pritchard (1962) · Bernard Haitink (1967) · Georg Solti (1979) · Klaus Tennstedt (1983) · Franz Welser-Möst (1990) · Kurt Masur (2000) · Vladimir Jurowski (2007)
v • d • e
Cleveland Orchestra Music Directors

Nikolai Sokoloff (1918) · Artur Rodziński (1933) · Erich Leinsdorf (1943) · George Szell (1946) · Pierre Boulez (1970) · Lorin Maazel (1972) · Christoph von Dohnányi (1984) · Franz Welser-Möst (2002)