Musical America’s Susan Elliot reports the following:
Marek Janowski will step down as artistic director and chief conductor of the Rundfunk Sinfonieorchester Berlin (Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra) in summer 2016. “I do very much appreciate that I again was offered a long contract,” he said of the orchestra’s intent to renew his tenure. “However, after intense deliberations I have come to the conclusion that after 14 years it is wise to initiate a change in the management of the orchestra.”
Janowski, 76, had been offered an additional term of five years.
Intendant Dagmar Reim said the ensemble regretted his decision. “The Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra owes much to Marek Janowski,” he said. “In difficult times he encouraged the orchestra and he has shaped it into one of the top orchestras of the Republic. We thank him for a great era.”
Read the full article at www.musicalamerica.com.
Born in 1939 in Warsaw and educated in Germany, Marek Janowski’s artistic path led him from Assistant positions in Aachen, Cologne, Düsseldorf and Hamburg to his appointment as General Music Director in Freiburg im Breisgau (1973-75) and Dortmund (1975-79). Janowski has been Artistic Director of the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin since 2002—at which time the ensemble had been without an artistic director for several years—and in 2005 he was also appointed Musical Director of the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande in Geneva (2005-2012). He is in demand as a guest conductor throughout the world, working on a regular basis in the USA with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra (where he holds the Otto Klemperer Guest Conducting Chair), the Boston and San Francisco Symphony Orchestras, the Philadelphia Orchestra, and in Europe with the Orchestre de Paris, the Orchester der Tonhalle Zürich, the Danish National Symphony Orchestra in Copenhagen and the NDR-Sinfonieorchester Hamburg.
[Sources: musicalamerica.com, pentatonemusic.com, Photo: Felix Broede via berlinerfestspiele.de]