Gerard Schwarz, Conductor
Music Director, All-Star Orchestra
Music Director, Eastern Music Festival
Conductor Laureate, Seattle Symphony
-Joshua Kosman, Gramophone Magazine |
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Conductor Gerard Schwarz and His All-Star Orchestra of Top Musicians from across the Country Star in a New WNET/American Public Television Classical Music Television Series
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Internationally recognized for his moving performances, innovative programming and extensive catalog of recordings, American conductor Gerard Schwarz serves as Music Director of the All-Star Orchestra, an ensemble of top musicians from America’s leading orchestras featured in a new television series airing throughout the United States on public television. As in baseball, Schwarz has created an “all-star” team of top musical athletes for an eight episode series created to encourage a greater understanding and enjoyment of classical music. The series will also be released by Naxos as a DVD. Schwarz also serves as Music Director of the Eastern Music Festival in North Carolina and Conductor Laureate of the Seattle Symphony.
With more than 300 world premieres to his credit, Schwarz has always felt strongly about commissioning and performing new music. A new initiative with the Eastern Music Festival, the Bonnie McElveen Hunter Commissioning Project, will bring ten new world premieres from American composers to the festival over a period of ten years. Richard Danielpour’s A Prayer for Our Time was featured in summer of 2013 and John Corigliano’s work for violin and orchestra will be performed in 2014. During Schwarz’s tenure with the festival, he has expanded audiences to the largest in its history, incorporated a composer in residence program, developed three new concert series and increased the focus on new works with 15 world premieres over the last three seasons. A prolific recording artist, Schwarz’s total discography numbers nearly 350 on more than 11 labels. His pioneering cycles of American symphonists such as William Schuman, David Diamond and Howard Hanson have received high critical praise, as have his acclaimed series of Stravinsky ballets, symphony cycles of Robert Schumann, Gustav Mahler and Dmitri Shostakovich as well as his orchestral works of Richard Wagner, Richard Strauss and Rimsky-Korsakov. More than 50 discs featuring Gerard Schwarz and the Seattle Symphony – with works by 54 composers ranging from the Baroque to contemporary periods – were released in the last two years. In addition to his numerous recordings with the Seattle Symphony, he has also recorded with the Berlin Radio Symphony, Czech Philharmonic, English Chamber Orchestra, Juilliard Orchestra, London Symphony, Los Angeles Chamber Symphony, New York Chamber Symphony, Orchestre National de France, Philadelphia Orchestra, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Tokyo Philharmonic and Eastern Music Festival. (learn more) |