First Woman Music Director for a Major US Orchestra

   Tim Smith, Baltimore Sun, 7/15

   BALTIMORE -- Marin Alsop is to be the next music director of the
   Baltimore Symphony, according to the Baltimore Sun.  She will
   succeed Yuri Temirkanov, who departs at the end of 2005-2006
   after seven seasons with the orchestra.

   Alsop, 48, is former music director of the Colorado Symphony and
   currently in that post with the Bournemouth Symphony.  A onetime
   protege of Leonard Bernstein, she has long been a podium favorite
   among British orchestras and music critics.  Her new appointment
   is a major milestone for women conductors everywhere; she is
   certainly the first woman to hold the post with a major American
   ensemble.

   Alsop is also a proponent of American music, a genre in which
   the Baltimore Symphony specialized under Temirkanov's predecessor,
   David Zinman.  Hopefully that repertoire will reappear in coming
   seasons.

   The Baltimore Symphony has an accumulated deficit of $10 million.
   Alsop's willingness to talk with media, patrons and audiences
   will no doubt help with funding and outreach issues.

Janos Gereben/SF
www.sfcv.org
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