Kurt Sanderling

Conductor

Kurt Sanderling was born in Arys / Germany in September 1912.At the age of 18 he began his artistic career as repetiteur at the Städtische Oper Berlin. Otto Klemperer, Erich Kleiber, Leo Blech und Wilhelm Furtwängler were the conductors of that time, whose concerts and opera performances gave the young Kurt Sanderling decisive artistic impetus and impressed him deeply. In 1936 - in the meantime Kurt Sanderling had to leavehis home country for racial reasons - he was engaged as a conductor at Radio Moscow. A guest performance with the Leningrad Philharmonic led to a relationship of many years with this orchestra, which he conducted jointly with Yevgeni Mravinski from 1942 - 1960. Besides that Kurt Sanderling was professor and in charge of a conductors` class at the Leningrad Conservatory in 1945 and 1946.

In 1960 he followed a call to his old home country and took over the Berlin Symphony Orchestra as the chief conductor. From 1964 - 1967 he was also chief conductor of the world - renowed Dresdner Staatskapelle.Maestro Sanderlings` comprehensive repertoire comprises works of all musical areas. However, he loves specially the works by Gustav Mahler and Dmitri Shostakovich. He recorded various composers for the labels of ETERNA, MELODIA, SUPRAPHON, DEUTSCHE GRAMMOPHON, EMI, TELDEC and ERATO: The recording of Brahms` four symphonies for ETERNA may stand for many, as well as the first digital recording of Beethovens`nine symphonies with the Philharmonia Orchestra London for EMI.In 1977 Kurt Sanderling gave up his position as chief conductor of the Berlin Symphony Orchestra and has since devoted himself exclusively to his many guest engagements at home and abroad.Concert tours have led Kurt Sanderling to the world music centers, so to nearly all West and East European countries, to Japan, Israel and the United States of America. There he was a regular guest conductor at the leading orchestras as the Los Angeles and the New York Philharmonic Orchestras, the Boston and Chicago Symphony Orchestras and the Cleveland Orchestra.In Germany Kurt Sanderling conducts regulary the renowed orchestras including the Berliner and Münchener Philharmoniker, the Deutsches Sinfonie Orchester Berlin, the Symphony Orchestras of the Bayerische, the Westdeutsche and the Norddeutsche Radios in Munich, Cologne and Hamburg. Moreover Kurt Sanderling is a celebrated guest conductor at the Orchestre de Paris, the Philharmonia Orchestra London, the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, the Oslo and Bergen Philharmonic as well as the Symphony Orchestras of the Danish and Swedish Radios. In 1994 Kurt Sanderling was awarded the Großes Bundesverdienstkreuz (Order of the Federal Republic of Germany) and in January 1998 the Cannes Classical Award forhis artistic life-work.