The San Francisco Symphony (SFS)
made its musical debut in December 1911, and it has remained a vital element of
the city's cultural identity ever since.
The very first piece the
orchestra recorded was the overture to the Auber opera, Fra Diavolo. Hertz also
helped broaden the orchestra's appeal by having it perform live on radio; he
retired in 1930.
The Great Depression caused
significant financial distress for the San Francisco Symphony. Bankruptcy
seemed likely after the orchestra cancelled its 1934-35 season, but voters in
San Francisco approved a bond measure that provided significant public funding
to cover operating expenses. Ozawa also elected to become music director of the
Boston Symphony. Under the leadership of Dutch conductor Edo de Waart, who took
over for Ozawa in 1977, the SFS concert season was greatly expanded. Michael
Tilson Thomas has led the San Francisco Symphony since 1995, coming to the
organization directly from his stint with the London Symphony Orchestra.
The London Symphony Orchestra
(LSO) was founded in 1904 as the first British musical ensemble to be owned
entirely by its member-players. Many of the orchestra's British-born conductors
and/or music directors have gone on to earn knighthoods, including Edward
Elgar, Thomas Beecham, Adrian Boult, John Barbirolli, Hamilton Harty, and Henry
Wood.
Russian Valery Gergiev has been
the orchestra's principal conductor since 2007.
The Barbican Centre, the largest center for the performing arts in
all of Europe, is the official home of the London Symphony Orchestra. The BBC
Symphony Orchestra performs here as well.
Since then, the orchestra has earned the title of World's Most
Recorded Orchestra; given its continued impetus within this realm, the ensemble
should retain that crown well into the 21st century.
The most populous French-speaking
city in Canada has been home to several different ensembles to bear the name
"Montreal Symphony Orchestra." Wilfrid Pelletier, a Canadian-born
conductor and pianist, formed the current incarnation of the Montreal Symphony
Orchestra (MSO) in 1934, although the ensemble was known as Les Concerts
Symphoniques until officially changing its name in 1954. Renowned conductor
Zubin Mehta was the music director from 1961 to 1967, helping to establish the
orchestra's professional reputation by leading it on several European tours.
But it was the leadership of
Swiss-born Charles Dutoit, artistic and music director from 1977 to 2002, which
gave the Montreal Symphony Orchestra its greatest international exposure.
Dutoit emphasized a great many modern works and recorded the music of Ravel,
Prokofiev, Tchaikovsky, Stravinsky, and Bartok.It was into this maelstrom, in
early 2006, that Kent Nagano stepped as the orchestra's new music director.
Numerous buildings have served as
the home of the Paris Opera [French: Opéra de Paris] since Louis XIV founded
the company in 1669. Inaugurated in 1875, the building is informally named for
its designer, Charles Garnier, although its original official name was the
National Academy of Music. The remaining years of the 19th century were
extremely important ones for the Paris Opera and Palais Garnier.
French composers such as Jules
Massenet and Charles Gounod enjoyed great success throughout Europe and the
rest of the opera world, and many of their major works had their premieres at
Palais Garnier. This list includes Massenet's Le roi de Lahore [1877], Le Cid
[1885] and Thaïs [1894], plus Gounod's revisions of two earlier works intended
to specifically accommodate the house's much larger dimensions: Sapho [1884]
and Roméo et Juliette [1888].
