Gennadij Roschdestwenskij

In memoriam

19.6.2018
gennady_rozhdestvensky

The Wiener Symphoniker mourn the death of their former Music Director Gennadij Roschdestwenskij

The Russian conductor Gennadij Roschdestwenskij died last weekend in his native Moscow at the age of 87 years according to the Tschaikovski-Conservatory at which Roschdestwenskij worked.
Born 1931 in Moscow, Roschdestwenskij was one of the best known conductor of his time. His parents were the noted conductor and pedagogue Nikolai Anosov and soprano Natalya Rozhdestvenskaya. He studied conducting with his father at the Moscow Conservatory and piano with Lev Oborin. Already known for having conducted Tchaikovsky's The Nutcracker ballet at the Bolshoi Theatre at the age of 20, he quickly established his reputation. He premiered many works by Soviet composers, including Edison Denisov's Le soleil des Incas ("The Sun of the Incas"; 1964), as well as giving the Russian premiere of Benjamin Britten's A Midsummer Night's Dream and the Western premiere of Dmitri Shostakovich's Fourth Symphony at the 1962 Edinburgh Festival.

At the age of 30 years Roschdestwenskij was apppointed Music Director of the Moscow Radio Symphony Orchestra and in 1965 additionaly of the Boshoi Theatre. In 1975 he became Chief Conductor of the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic and in 1978 of the BBC Symphony Orchestra London. From 1981-1983 he was Music Director of the Wiener Symphomniker. 

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