Guest Conductors

Principal Guest Conductor - Ignat Solzhenitsyn

Recognized as one of today's most gifted artists, and enjoying an active career as both conductor and pianist, Ignat Solzhenitsyn's lyrical and poignant interpretations have won him critical acclaim throughout the world.

Ignat Solzhenitsyn is in his fifth season as Music Director of the Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia, having served as its Principal Conductor for the preceding six years. He also serves as Principal Guest Conductor of the Moscow Symphony Orchestra. His recent guest soloists in Philadelphia have included Sylvia McNair, Cho-Liang Lin, Steven Isserlis, Gary Graffman, Sergei Leiferkus, Anton Kuerti, and Leila Josefowicz. Mr. Solzhenitsyn has led the Chamber Orchestra in numerous special projects, including Bach’s Saint John Passion and the complete Brandenburg Concerti, Haydn’s The Creation and Seven Last Words, the complete symphonies of Schubert, and a rare complete performance of Gluck’s Don Juan.

Mr. Solzhenitsyn has appeared as guest conductor with the symphonies of Dallas, Seattle, Indianapolis, Buffalo, North Carolina, Toledo, Virginia, New Jersey, and Nashville, as well as many of the major orchestras in Russia including the St. Petersburg Philharmonic, the Moscow Philharmonic, the Moscow Symphony, the Urals Philharmonic, and the Kremlin Philharmonic.

In recent seasons, his extensive touring schedule in the United States and Europe has included concerto performances with numerous major orchestras, including those of Boston, Chicago, Philadelphia, Saint Louis, Los Angeles, Seattle, Baltimore, Washington, Montreal, Toronto, London, Paris, Naples, St. Petersburg, Israel, and Sydney, and collaborations with such distinguished conductors as Andr? Previn, Herbert Blomstedt, Yuri Temirkanov, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Mstislav Rostropovich, Gerard Schwarz, Charles Dutoit, James DePreist, Krzysztof Penderecki, David Zinman, Jerzy Semkov, James Conlon, Lawrence Foster and Maxim Shostakovich. In addition to his recital appearances in the United States at Philadelphia's Academy of Music, St. Paul's Ordway Theatre, San Francisco’s Herbst Theatre, and many others from coast to coast, Mr. Solzhenitsyn has also given numerous recitals in Europe and the Far East in such major musical centers as London, Milan, Zurich, Moscow, Tokyo, and Sydney.

An avid chamber musician, Mr. Solzhenitsyn has collaborated with the Emerson, Borodin, Brentano, St. Petersburg and Lydian String Quartets, and in four-hand recital with Mitsuko Uchida. He has frequently appeared at international festivals, including Salzburg, Evian, Ludwigsburg, Caramoor, Ojai, Marlboro, Nizhniy Novgorod and Moscow’s famed December Evenings.

A winner of the Avery Fisher Career Grant, Ignat Solzhenitsyn serves on the piano faculty of the Curtis Institute of Music. He has been featured on many radio and television specials, including CBS Sunday Morning and ABC’s Nightline. Born in Moscow, Mr. Solzhenitsyn resides in the United States with his wife and three children.

Charles Ansbacher

Charles Ansbacher holds titled positions with orchestras in Boston, Moscow, Sarajevo, and Bishkek. Mr. Ansbacher has had a 25-year career working in the performing arts and serving in civic, state, and national leadership positions in. Mr. Ansbacher has played dual roles as an event producer and arts administrator, concerned with producing musical concerts of high quality and great public impact. He has continually strived to make the arts accessible to all through innovative programs aimed at more fully integrating the arts into the life of the community.

Mr. Ansbacher is the founder and conductor of the Boston Landmarks Orchestra (founded in 2001), which gives free classical music concerts at public landmarks around the Boston area.

Building upon multiple concerts with the Moscow Symphony Orchestra in that city's Tchaikovsky Hall, as well as the Great Hall of the Moscow Conservatory, Ansbacher has conducted the MSO on four CD’s. The Landmarks Orchestra annually incubates a new work for children, and two of the MSO cds are Make Way for Ducklings, and The Midnight Ride of Paul Revere. For adults, Ansbacher has led the MSO recording Beethoven Fourths: his Symphony and Piano Concerto, as well as Landmark Overtures.

Arthur Arnold

Arthur Arnold was born in The Netherlands. He first studied the cello with Dmitri Ferschtman (Amsterdam) and Christopher Bunting (London). He was principal solo-cellist in the Flevolands Chamber Orchestra, played in the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra and was one of the members of the cello octet Conjunto Iberico, with whom he played at major festivals in Europe, USA and Canada.

Arthur Arnold has been assistant conductor of Hans Vonk (music director and chief conductor of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra, USA). He assisted maestro Vonk in St. Louis and with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, the Concertgebouw Orchestra, the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra and the Netherlands Opera.

In 1997 Arnold became principal guest conductor of the Chopin Symphony Orchestra, Warsaw. In ‘98-‘99 he was conductor of the Raduga Chamber Orchestra, Amsterdam. In July 1999 he successfully conducted Seoul National Symphony Orchestra and was appointed to be their principal guest conductor. In 2000-2001 Arnold conducted MSO in the Robeco Summer Concerts series in the Concertgebouw, Amsterdam.

Sergey Stadler

Sergey Stadler Born May 30, 1962 in Leningrad into a family of musicians. Graduated from the specialized school of the Leningrad Rimsky-Korsakov State Conservatory and then did his postgraduate course at the Moscow State Conservatory.

Winner of a number of international concerts such as "Concertino- Prague" (1976, First Prize), Long- Thibaud Contest (Paris, 1979, Grand-Prix and a special prize for the best performance of French music), Sibelius Contest (Helsinki, 1980, Second Prize and a special public prize), Tchaikovsky Contest (Moscow, 1982, First Prize and Gold medal). The only violinist in the world to be awarded the honour to play Paganini's violin in a concert.

Stadler is the main conductor of Saint-Petersburg Theatre of opera and ballet by the name of Rimsky – Korsakov. He is founder, art director and the main conductor of symphony orchestra “Stars of Saint – Petersburg”. Honoured Actor of Russia.

Wilson Hermanto

The Indonesian-American conductor Wilson Hermanto was born in 1972 in Jakarta. He completed his formal music education with high honors in violin from the Peabody Conservatory of Music in Baltimore and in conducting from the Manhattan School of Music in New York.

Mr. Hermanto has made appearances with orchestras such as, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Florida Orchestra, the Lausanne Chamber Orchestra, the National Arts Centre Orchestra in Ottawa, the Schleswig-Holstein Festival Orchestra, the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra, the Sofia Symphony Orchestra and the Sinfonietta Cracovia. Mr. Hermanto founded and served as Music Director of the Prometheus Chamber Orchestra in New York from 1996 to 2002. Since September 2004, Mr. Hermanto works as Assistant Conductor to Maestro Christoph Eschenbach with the Orchestre de Paris. During the 2006-07 Season, Mr. Hermanto made his debut conducting the Brandenburgische Staatsorchester Frankfurt. In June 2007 Wilson Hermanto.

Riccardo Capasso

Born in Gorizia, Riccardo Capasso distinguishes himself for his activity as a conductor both in concerts and operas, often combined with didactic engagements.

In 1967 Riccardo Capasso won ex-aequo the First prize in the Italian Radio competition for young conductors, and since then he began his prestigious career in important Italian institutions as Radio Orchestras of Turin, Napoli and Milan, Arena Verona, Petruzzelli Bari, The London Symphony Orchestra, Budapest MAV Symphony Orchestra, National Orchestra of Russia, State Symphonic Orchestra of Russia, Philharmonic Orchestra of Russia, the Moscow Symphony Orchestra, Novaia Opera House of Moscow, Philharmonic Orchestra of St. Petersburg, Cape Town Opera House, Johannesburg National Symphony Orchestra, Beijing National Opera House, Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, Melbourne UN Symphonic Orchestra, Kiev State Opera Theatre, National Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine, Bucarest National Opera House.

In 2007 he celebrated the 50° anniversary of the Toscanini death with a Gala-concert at the Moscow Svetlanov Grand Hall of the Performing Arts Centeк conducting The MSO.