Opera News – The Metropolitan Opera
announced that the acclaimed conductor Yannick Nézet-Séguin will be the
company’s new Music Director. The position has previously been held by only two
artists in the company’s storied 133-year history—James Levine, who after 40
years in the position stepped down at the end of the recently concluded season
to become the company’s first Music Director Emeritus, and Rafael Kubelik, who
held the title briefly in the company’s 1973-74 season.
The 41-year-old conductor will become
only the third Music Director in the history of the Met.
In the Met’s 2017-18 season,
Nézet-Séguin will assume the interim title of Music Director Designate. He will
become Music Director in the 2020-21 season, the first season in which he is
available to take over the full responsibilities of the position. However, he
will immediately become involved in the company’s artistic planning, which
happens many years in advance.
As Music Director, Nézet-Séguin will be
responsible for the overall musical quality of the Met. He will have artistic
authority over the company’s orchestra, chorus, and music staff, and will work
in tandem with Met General Manager Peter Gelb to oversee the planning and
casting of each Met season, including repertoire choices, new productions
(including the selection of creative teams), revivals, and commissions.
Nézet-Séguin will initially conduct five
different operas each season he is Music Director, as well as concerts with the
Met Orchestra. In each of the seasons in which he is Music Director Designate,
Nézet-Séguin will conduct two operas. Next season at the Met, he will conduct
his first Wagner opera with the company, a revival of Der Fliegende Holländer.
“Becoming the Music Director of the Metropolitan
Opera is the fulfillment of a lifelong dream for me,” said Nézet-Séguin. “I am
truly honored and humbled by the opportunity to succeed the legendary James
Levine and to work with the extraordinary orchestra, chorus, and staff of what
I believe is the greatest opera company in the world. I will make it my mission
to passionately preserve the highest artistic standards while imagining a new,
bright future for our art form.”
“Yannick was the clear choice of the
Company,” said Gelb. “He is the right artist at the right time to lead us
forward into a new and what I believe will be a glorious chapter in the history
of the Met.”
“The Metropolitan Opera has been the
great artistic love of my life, and it has been tremendously rewarding to see
the company develop and improve over the past 45 years,” said Levine. “I offer
my heartfelt congratulations to Yannick on taking the musical reins, and I look
forward to seeing the good work continue under his watch.”
“The MET Orchestra enjoys a tremendously
fruitful, positive relationship with Maestro Nézet-Séguin, and we are delighted
in his appointment as Music Director,” said Jessica Phillips, clarinetist and
chair of the Met’s Orchestra committee. “He embodies the artistic leadership,
musical excellence, and respect for rich tradition that opera lovers around the
world have come to cherish. We eagerly look forward to working together to
shape this new era at the Met.”
“The singers and stage performers at the
Met welcome Yannick Nézet-Séguin, joining the historic line of artists from
James Levine’s great tenure back to Toscanini and Mahler,” said David Frye,
tenor and chair of the Met’s chorus committee. “Yannick has led great
performances with the company, and we’re eager to expand our collaboration.”
Nézet-Séguin made his Met debut in the
2009-10 season, conducting a new production of Bizet’s Carmen. He has returned
in every subsequent season, leading acclaimed performances of Verdi’s Don
Carlo, Gounod’s Faust, Verdi’s La Traviata, and Dvořák’s Rusalka. He led the opening
night performance of the Met’s 2015-16 season, a new production of Verdi’s
Otello.
Nézet-Séguin’s operatic career was
launched when he was appointed Chorus Master and Assistant Conductor of the
Montreal Opera at age 23. Since then, he has conducted a wide breadth of
repertoire at a number of the leading companies, including the Vienna State
Opera; the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden; La Scala; Dutch National Opera;
and the Salzburg Festival, in addition to the Met. He is also a frequent guest
conductor of the Berlin Philharmonic, the Vienna Philharmonic, the Bavarian
Radio Symphony Orchestra, the London Philharmonic, and the Chamber Orchestra of
Europe.
Since 2012, Nézet-Séguin has been Music
Director of the Philadelphia Orchestra, which announced today that he has
extended his contract with them through 2025-26. (A separate press release on
that announcement is available.) Given the close proximity of New York and
Philadelphia, Nézet-Séguin will be able to easily commute between his two
posts, and the Met and the Philadelphia Orchestra will also be exploring the
possibilities for artistic collaboration between the two institutions. Nézet-Séguin is also the Music Director of
Montreal’s Orchestre Métropolitain and of the Rotterdam Philharmonic, a
position he will resign at the conclusion of the 2017-18 season.
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