Karina Canellakis to Detroit???

[moldyoldie]

I've just read the following snippet inan article by noted classical music columnist, critic, gadfly, and gossip-monger Norman Lebrecht:
"...Karina Canellakis [...] is favoured to succeed Leonard Slatkin in Detroit." Her recent performance leading the DSO in the Shostakovich Symphony No. 8 at Orchestra Hall blew me away!

[John F]

The breach came in 2002 when Marin Alsop was appointed by the Bournemouth Symphony

As usual, Lebrecht is not to be trusted to get the facts straight. His overview of women conductors is inconsistent and incoherent. From 1998 until 2002, Simone Young was chief conductor of the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra; she had been the first female conductor of the Vienna State Opera in 1993.

As for Lebrecht's speculation about the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, I wouldn't bet a nickel on his say-so. It may happen, it may not, but if it does, it will be the first time since before World War I that this orchestra hasn't had a "name" music director. Karina Canellakis may be very good, I've never heard anything she's done, but she's at the very beginning of her career, and the situation in Detroit and with the orchestra is such that I'd think its board would want a very experienced music director rather than a neophyte who until recently was playing in the violin section of orchestras rather than leading them.

[stickles]

Watch her in action with Royal Stockholm Philharmonic in Dvorak 7th on their website here:
https://www.konserthuset.se/en/play/dvo ... ony-no.-7/

Shortly afterwards she was invited by them to conduct the 2018 Nobel Prize concert. Video of that concert may be available later in the year.

YouTube also has audio files of some of her outings with various orchestras. Several Beethovan symphonies and a notable Shostakovich 8.

[John F]

However good her performances may have been, there's a lot more to being music director of an American orchestra than making music. Especially in Detroit. The orchestra's board recognized that when they chose Leonard Slatkin as their most recent music director. A similar candidate would be David Robinson, who has just left the St. Louis Symphony after 13 successful seasons. He's now chief conductor of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, having repeatedly been passed over for higher positions in the US despite heavy promotion by the music critics. I wouldn't bet on him either, that's a lot of frequent flyer miles between Australia and Michigan, but someone like him seems to me more likely than Canellakis. We'll see.

[moldyoldie]

However good her performances may have been, there's a lot more to being music director of an American orchestra than making music. Especially in Detroit. The orchestra's board recognized that when they chose Leonard Slatkin as their most recent music director.

The last "youngish" music director the DSO hired, Aldo Ceccato in 1973, was a short-lived affair that was ultimately deemed a mistake. Of course, the timing during the post-Watergate recession couldn't have been worse.

[THEHORN]

Is Karina Canellakis related to the conductor Martin Canellakis, who regularly conducted concerts with a part time orchestra he had founded at the Colden center auditorium at Queens college, C.U.N.Y . when I was a graduate student there ?

[maestrob]

Is Karina Canellakis related to the conductor Martin Canellakis, who regularly conducted concerts with a part time orchestra he had founded at the Colden center auditorium at Queens college, C.U.N.Y . when I was a graduate student there ?

Hi, Robert. The answer is yes. Wikipedia says that Karina is Martin's daughter. Her web page is quite extraordinary and well put together.


http://karinacanellakis.com/

[THEHORN]

Thanks for the information !