“After a three-year search, the Grand Rapids Symphony has named Los Angeles-based conductor Marcelo Lehninger as its next music director,” writes Shandra Martinez on Thursday’s (6/2) MLive.com (Michigan). The Brazilian-born Lehninger, 36, was “the unanimous choice” of the orchestra’s search committee “following his electrifying performance of Dvorak’s ‘New World’ Symphony … in February 2015, and an explosive performance of Respighi’s ‘Pines of Rome’ this past April.” Lehninger, whose contract starts July 1 and runs through the 2020-21 season, is a graduate of the Conductors Institute at Bard College and an alumnus of the National Conducting Institute. He was assistant conductor under Kurt Masur with the Orchestre National de France during a residency in Vienna. Lehninger spent three years as assistant conductor, and two as associate conductor, at the Boston Symphony Orchestra. In 2014, while serving as music director of California’s New West Symphony (where his four-year tenure has just concluded), Lehninger “was awarded the prestigious Helen M. Thompson Award … by the League of American Orchestras.” Grand Rapids Symphony Executive Director Peter Kjome said Lehninger “will build on a long tradition of excellence as the symphony and our superb musicians serve our community through the orchestra’s concerts and educational programs.”
Posted June 3, 2016
