VIENNA FESTIVAL ORCHESTRA
Music Director and Conductor Derek Gleeson
Manager: Jean-Jacques Cesbron
Territory: United States
ABOUT
The Vienna Festival Orchestra was established in the 1950s by Hans Swarowsky. A highly regarded conductor of his time and professor of conducting at the Vienna Hochschule fur Musik. Both Claudio Abbado and Zubin Mehta were amongst his many famous students.
The orchestra was initially comprised of members of both the Vienna State Opera Orchestra (Vienna Philharmonic) and the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, further complemented with a number of Viennese classical musical freelance instrumentalists.
The orchestra was established primarily as both a recording orchestra and orchestra available to perform live at various music festivals throughout Austria and Hungary.
Since Swarowsky’s death in 1975, the Vienna Festival Orchestra has been reconstituted a number of times.
Principally under the batons of Philip Vernal, Herbert Bohmer, Tibor Varga, Rudolph Langer and Max Schoenherr. And most recently with Irish conductor Derek Gleeson, a dual resident of Vienna, Sofia and Los Angeles, and a student of the Viennese conducting tradition where he studied with Karl Osterreicher, Swarowsky’s student and successor professor at the Hochschule fur Musik.
The orchestra is now primarily a touring orchestra presenting the great Austrian classical music tradition throughout the world. Forthcoming tours and festivals include performances in China, USA, India and the Middle East. Its repertoire ranges from Beethoven and Mozart to Strauss to Mahler to Schoenberg and Webern. All the great Austrian music traditions are featured.
MUSIC DIRECTOR & CONDUCTOR
Derek Gleeson