Christoph von Dohnányi

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Christoph von Dohnányi (born September 8, 1929) is a world renowned German conductor. Scion of a prominent Hungarian-German political and musical family. He became Germany´s youngest GMD in Lübeck in 1957, he was chief conductor of Staatsorchester Kassel, chief conductor of the WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne, GMD and director of the Frankfurt Opera, intendant and chief conductor of the Hamburgische Staatsoper, long-time music director of the Cleveland Orchestra, maintaining its reputation as one of the greatest orchestras in the world, and has been the principal conductor of the Philharmonia orchestra in London since 1997. As a guest conductor, he has led many of the most prominent orchestras in the United States and Europe.

A grandson of pianist and composer Ernő Dohnányi, he is considered a living link to the Austro-German performance tradition and has received particular acclaim for recordings of Central European masters, including the complete symphonies of Beethoven, Brahms, Mendelssohn, and Robert Schumann as well as many major works by Bruckner, Dvorák, Gustav Mahler, Arnold Schoenberg, Richard Strauss, Webern and others.

Contents 1 Biography 1.1 Youth and World War II 1.2 Education and early engagements 1.3 Cleveland years 1.4 Post-Cleveland 1.5 Family 2 References 3 External links

[edit] Biography

[edit] Youth and World War II

Dohnányi was born in Berlin, Germany to jurist Hans von Dohnanyi and Christine Bonhoeffer. His uncle on his mother's side was Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a pastor and philosopher. His father, uncle and other family members participated in the German Resistance movement against Nazism and were arrested and detained in several concentration camps before being executed in 1945, when Christoph was 15 years old.^[1] Dohnányi's older brother is Klaus von Dohnanyi, a German polititian and former mayor of Hamburg.^[2]

[edit] Education and early engagements

After the war, Dohnányi studied law in Munich, but in 1948 he transferred to the Hochschule für Musik und Theater München to study composition, piano and conducting. At the opera in Munich, he was a stage extra, coached singers, and was a house pianist. He received the Richard Strauss Prize from the city of Munich, and then went to Florida State University to study with his grandfather, Ernst von Dohnányi.

His first position as assistant was at the Frankfurt Opera, appointed by Georg Solti, where he also served as a ballet and opera coach. He was general musical director of the Lübeck Opera from 1957-1963. He also served as chief conductor of the Westdeutsche Rundfunk Sinfonie Orchester. In 1968, he succeeded Solti as general music director and later 'director' at the Frankfurt opera and served in both capacities until 1977. He took the positions of intendant and chief conductor with the Hamburg Staatsoper in 1977, and relinquished those posts in 1984.

As director of the Frankfurt Opera and with his team including Gerard Mortier (Director of Theatre de la Monnaie, Brussels, Salzburg Festival, Opera de Paris), Peter Mario Katona (Director of Casting at ROH Covent Garden) and Klaus Schultz (Director of Mannheim, Aachen, Gärtnerplatztheater in Munic), the balance in programming of traditional opera performance and innovative Musiktheater, promoting the idea of Regietheater, established Frankfurt opera as a leading house at that time. He continued this concept in Hamburg.

[edit] Cleveland years

Dohnányi's enduring fame owes largely to a relationship with the Cleveland Orchestra that would span two decades. He made his conducting debut with the orchestra in December 1981, and his appointment to serve as music director (commencing with the start of the 1984-85 season) was announced the following year. At the time of Dohnányi's appointment, he was a relatively young unknown in the shadow of the famously autocratic George Szell, who had forged the orchestra into a world-class ensemble by the time of his death in 1970.^[3] Dohnányi's kinship with Szell both in terms of musical training and micro-managerial conducting style portended that his relationship with the orchestra would be a successful one. In Dohnányi's 18 year tenure at its helm, the Cleveland Orchestra was consistently tauted as the finest orchestra in the United States and among the finest in the world, pursuing an active touring and recording agenda.^[4] In spite of it all, Dohnányi was keenly aware of and bemused by the fact that their achievements were frequently overlooked: "We give a great concert. . .and George Szell gets a great review." ^[5] Dohnányi was named the first ever "Music Director Laureate of the Cleveland Orchestra" upon his retirement in 2002.

[edit] Post-Cleveland

In 1994, Dohnányi became the principal guest conductor of the Philharmonia orchestra in London, U.K., and in 1997 their Principal Conductor. He plans to relinquish this position in 2008 to Esa-Pekka Salonen and become 'Honorary Conductor for Life' of the Philharmonia. In April 2007, Dohnányi was one of eight conductors of British orchestras to endorse the 10-year classical music outreach manifesto, "Building on Excellence: Orchestras for the 21st Century", to increase the presence of classical music in the UK, including giving free entry to all British schoolchildren to a classical music concert.^[6][7]

In 2004, Dohnányi returned to Hamburg, Germany where he maintained a residence for many years to become chief conductor of the NDR Symphony Orchestra. He has also made guest appearances with many major orchestras, including the Boston Symphony Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony, Pittsburgh Symphony and recorded widely with the Cleveland Orchestra and the Vienna Philharmonic. His conducting commitments always included opera perfomance. With the Philharmonia Orchestra a residence at Theatre du Chatelet in Paris was maintained (Die Frau ohne Schatten, Moses und Aron, Oedipus Rex, Hänsel und Gretel, Die Schweigsame Frau, Arabella), at the Salzburg Festival Rosenkavalier, The Bassarids, Baal, Salome, Cosi fan tutte, Erwartung/Bluebeard´s Castle, Die Zauberflöte, Ariadne auf Naxos) and at ROH (Meistersinger, Fidelio, Der Fliegende Holländer, Salome, Die Frau ohne Schatten, Arabella), Opernhaus Zürich (Frau ohne Schatten, Bluebeard´s Castle/Oedipus Rex, Die Schweigsame Frau, Un ballo in maschera, Idomeneo, Der Fliegende Holländer, Elektra, Ariadne auf Naxos) and Opera Paris (Frau ohne Schatten, Wozzeck, Elektra) and many more.

[edit] Family

Dohnányi has been married three times. His first wife was the German actress Renate Zillessen, and they had two children. His second wife was the German soprano / mezzo-soprano Anja Silja, with whom he had three children. His third wife is pianist Barbara Koller.^[1]

[edit] References

• Rosenberg, Donald (2000). The Cleveland Orchestra Story. Cleveland, OH: Gray & Company. ISBN 1886228248. 

[edit] External links

• Christoph von Dohnányi at All Music Guide
• Christoph von Dohnányi biography at the Philharmonia
• Christoph von Dohnányi biography at the Cleveland Orchestra

Preceded by none	Principal Conductor, WDR Symphony Orchestra, Cologne 1964-1969	Succeeded by Zdenek Macal
Preceded by Lovro von Matačić	General Music Director and Chief Intendant, Frankfurt Opera 1967-1977	Succeeded by Michael Gielen
Preceded by Lorin Maazel	Music Director, Cleveland Orchestra 1984-2002 (Music Director Laureate as of 2002)	Succeeded by Franz Welser-Most
Preceded by Giuseppe Sinopoli	Principal Conductor, Philharmonia Orchestra 1997-2008 (Honorary Conductor for Life as of 2008)	Succeeded by Esa-Pekka Salonen (intendant)
Preceded by Christoph Eschenbach	Chief Conductor, NDR Symphony Orchestra 2004-present	Succeeded by incumbent

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)

v • d • e Philharmonia Principal Conductors
Otto Klemperer (1959) • Riccardo Muti (1973) • Giuseppe Sinopoli (1984) • Christoph von Dohnányi (1997)

v • d • e Orchestre de Paris Music Directors
Charles Münch (1967) • Herbert von Karajan (1969) • Georg Solti (1972) • Daniel Barenboim (1975) • Semyon Bychkov (1989) • Christoph von Dohnányi (1998) • Christoph Eschenbach (2000)

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