<<  -- 4 --  Kelly Ferjutz    WHAT MAKES A CONDUCTOR?

Günther Herbig served as Music Director of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra for six years, and was Music Director of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra for five years -- a position he gave up in 1994 to enable him to work in Europe more often. He continues to live in Michigan. From 1990 to 1997 he served as Visiting Professor of Conducting at Yale University, with a one-week master class each term.

Margaret Hillis known as a magnificent choral director, having worked in Cleveland as well as being the founder and director laureate of the Chicago Symphony Chorus, died in May 2001.

Kenneth Kiesler has been Music Director of the New Hampshire Symphony Orchestra since May of 2002. He has been Director of Orchestras and Professor of Conducting at the School of Music of the University of Michigan since 1995. He is also a trained wilderness guide and occasionally leads expeditions in the wilderness areas of Maine.

Kurt Masur became Music Director of the New York Philharmonic Orchestra for the 1992-93 Season, staying there for more than ten years. In September 2000, he became principal conductor of the London Philharmonic, and two years later became music director of the Orchestre National de France in Paris. On 11 and 12 November 2005 Kurt Masur conducted the Dresden Philharmonic at the Frauenkirche, as part of the events celebrating the reopening of the historic church, rebuilt after severe bombing during World War II. His website is: www.kurtmasur.com

Eduardo Mata was internationally renowned as conductor and composer, and died all too young, in an airplane accident near the Cuernavaca airport on 4 January 1995. He had been music director of the Dallas Symphony since 1977 until just two years before he died. Those last two years of his life would find him devoting extensive time to orchestras in South America, as well as the London Symphony Orchestra.

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