high-flying orchestras and opera houses experience migratory movements of musical directors every change of season. The return shows a new world order on the international podiums. And this time the baton dance is starring such popular names as Simon Rattle or Gustavo Dudamel, who have taken drastic decisions such as leaving London or Paris.
The British maestro, fabulous head of the Berlin Philharmonic for two decades, had reason to announce, in January 2021, that, after seven years at the helm of the London Symphony, in the 2022-2023 season he would become conductor emeritus for go to Germany But it wasn’t all “personal” reasons, as he hinted when he revealed that his next stage would be at the helm of the classic Rolls-Royce that is the Bavarian Radio Symphony, with its characteristic full and dark sound.
Living in Berlin with his wife, the mezzo Magdalena Kožená, and their children, the main problem for Rattle was that the concert hall project he pushed for as the new home of the London Symphony (replacing the already defunct Barbican Center) did not seem to come true. After covid and Brexit, the facility that Rattle had been campaigning for for a year and that was being advertised as a venue with transformative power for the classical in Britain, like what Tate Modern had for in the visual arts, it was seen as an elitist idea that could be dispensed with.
Interestingly, the Munich Orchestra that Sir Simon Rattle will now lead may have found in him a successor to the dream of Mariss Jansons, the last conductor, who died in 2019. That is, a new music hall in the financial district of the Bavarian capital . “London and Munich are cities that don’t have a proper music hall,” declared Rattle.
The vacancy at the London Symphony is now occupied by a released Antonio Pappano, who in October performs at the Auditorio Nacional in Madrid and the Palau de la Música Catalana. He who has been for two decades music director of the Royal Opera House in London and also of the Accademia Nazionalie di Santa Cecilia in Rome had been forced to reject unique proposals this period: places like La Scala, Paris, Bayreuth… The English maestro of Italian descent has not been able to set foot on these podiums as a leader of the London opera. And he has conducted only once at the Met in New York.
The versatile teacher born in Essex (1959) now cedes the throne of the Covent Garden fiefdom to the Moravian Jakub Hr?sa (Brno, 1981). If Pappano excelled in Verdi or Puccini more than in Central European and Slavic opera, Covent Garden now undertakes an opposite stage with an understanding of these repertoires, and will probably resort to guest batons when it has to comply with the Italianate.
On the other hand, the void left by Pappano at Santa Cecilia is filled by Daniel Harding, the gifted conductor/pilot who continues to lead the Swedish Radio Symphony (as well as being principal guest of the London Symphony).
As for Gustavo Dudamel, the flight from the Opéra de Paris in May suddenly left the French institution without a music director. Although there is no rush to find relief either. “We want to be sure,” admitted the theater manager, Alexander, after two short years of happy marriage with the Venezuelan. So, the projects that the desired Dudamel had to undertake are transferred to different batons, and not necessarily well-known ones, as is the case with the new Lohengrin by Kiril Serebrennikov.
Dudamel says he wants to be “with family and friends”. Paris was too absorbing and inflexible with the schedule of a global star. And, in fact, he wished he had time for other tasty projects in America, such as the ownership of the New York Philharmonic, which will begin in 2026, although he is already opening his mouth, without abandoning the adventure with the Philharmonic of Los Angeles and the moments of glory at the Walt Disney Concert Hall.
But if we return to Europe, another hot spot that the world of classical music follows with particular attention, is the relief of a totem such as Daniel Barenboim, already in delicate health, at the head of the Staatskapelle Berlin. In his hands, this orchestra has become the most well-endowed in Germany, with first-rate institutional connections. What other personality talks to sponsors? Which director would have a direct line with the German chancellor like he has with Angela Merkel?
Keeping all distances, his replacement could be Christian Thielemann. Or not The point is that the German musician, director of the Salzburg Easter Festival and (frustrated) aspirant to the podium of the Berlin Philharmonic, leaves the ownership of the Staatskapelle Dresden in the summer of 2024. A podium he has occupied since 2012 and which now he will have Daniele Gatti. So, the musical world would have given up on the erratic behavior that the Milanese maestro had with some women from the Concertgebouw Orchestra in 2018, shortly after getting the revered place in Amsterdam.
After that, the members of the formation did not take long to detect the baton of the future. And they have all the patience to get it. This is the very young Klaus Mäkelä. The 27-year-old Finnish maestro (currently in the Paris Orchestra, since they liquidated it with Harding) leaves the public speechless wherever he goes. And no one is surprised anymore that, despite his youth, he was appointed associate director of the Concertgebouw in 2021, with a view to making the title effective in 2027, since it is an orchestra that maintains leaders for decades.
By the way, the performance of the Israeli Lahav Shani at the head of the Munich Philharmonic at the recent San Sebastián Musical Fortnight was a resounding failure. And that in 2026, ownership begins in the German city, after the invasion of Ukraine caused the formation to dismiss Valery Gergiev.
