James Conlon
Equally well known in Europe and the U.S., James Conlon excels as an operatic and orchestral conductor. He is the longtime music director of the Los Angeles Opera.
Conlon was born in Queens, New York, on March 18, 1950. His father was a New York City government official, and his mother was a writer; no one in the family had any musical tendencies. When Conlon was 11, he saw a production of Verdi's La traviata and requested music lessons. He joined a children's chorus and enrolled at New York's High School of Music and Art. Conlon settled on conducting after a stint at the Aspen Music Festival conducting program. He matriculated at Juilliard School in Manhattan in 1968 and flourished there as a conducting student, leading the Juilliard Orchestra on a European tour in 1970. Back in the U.S., Conlon landed a post at the 1971 Spoleto Festival in South Carolina as a répétiteur. During the festival, he conducted a performance of Mussorgsky's Boris Godunov, the opera he had dreamed would mark his debut. Another boost to the young conductor's career came the following year, when soprano Maria Callas, at the school to give master classes, noticed Conlon's talents and suggested him as a replacement for an ailing conductor in a Juilliard production.
In 1974, Conlon became the youngest conductor ever to lead the New York Philharmonic Orchestra in a subscription series concert. His interests increasingly turned toward opera, and he made his debuts at the Metropolitan Opera in 1976 (in Mozart's Die Zauberflöte, the first of some 250 performances he would conduct there) and at London's Covent Garden in 1979. That year, he accepted a post as director of Cincinnati's May Festival, remaining in that position through 2016, but he was increasingly active in Europe as well, conducting the Paris Opera, the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in Italy, and from 1983 to 1991, the Rotterdam Philharmonic. In 1983, he made his recording debut on the Erato label, leading the London Philharmonic Orchestra on a recording of Liszt's piano concertos by François-René Duchâble.
In 1988, Conlon became the general music director of the city of Cologne, Germany, which involved the music directorships of both the Gürzenich Orchestra and Cologne Opera. He held that position until 2002, also conducting at the Lyric Opera of Chicago and the Paris National Opera during this period; he held his Paris post from 1995 until 2004, longer than any of his predecessors since 1939. In 2006, Conlon was named the music director of the Los Angeles Opera; he continued to hold that position as of the early 2020s. There and elsewhere, he has championed the works of composers affected by the Holocaust, including Viktor Ullmann, Erwin Schulhoff, and Alexander von Zemlinsky. Conlon's recording catalog includes more than 65 albums featuring him as conductor in both operatic and orchestral music, and these have won many awards. In 2022, he conducted artists from the Colburn School in Los Angeles in the Delos release Shapeshifter: Music of Erwin Schulhoff.
© James Manheim /TiVo
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Bruch: Symphonies & Concerto for two Pianos
Antal Doráti, James Conlon, Nathan Twining, Martin Berkofsky
Classical - Released by Warner Classics on Feb 23, 2009
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Ullmann, V.: Symphony No. 2 / 6 Lieder, Op. 17 / Concerto for Orchestra / Don Quixote Tanzt Fandango
Gürzenich-Orchester Köln, Juliane Banse, James Conlon
Classical - Released by Capriccio on Jan 1, 2003
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Poulenc: Concerto pour orgue & Concert champêtre
James Conlon, Marie-Claire Alain, Ton Koopman, Rotterdams Philharmonisch Orkest
Classical - Released by Warner Classics on Jan 1, 1986
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Stravinsky: Le Rossignol & Renard
Natalie Dessay, James Conlon, Orchestre de l'Opera National de Paris, Choeurs de l'Opéra National de Paris
Classical - Released by Warner Classics on Aug 27, 1999
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Chopin: Piano Concerto No. 1; Etudes Op. 10
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16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Mahler: Adagietto - Sinfonie Nr. 5
Classical - Released by Warner Classics International on Jan 1, 1994
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Liszt : Les Préludes, 2 Légendes, Mephisto Waltz No.1
Classical - Released by Warner Classics International on Oct 1, 1991
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Schulhoff, E.: Symphonies Nos. 2 and 5 / Suite
Symphonieorchester Des Bayerischen Rundfunks, James Conlon
Classical - Released by CapriccioNR on Jan 1, 2004
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Zemlinsky: Der Zwerg & Opern-Vorspiele & -Zwischenspiele
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Classical - Released by Warner Classics on Jan 14, 2012
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Shostakovich, D.: Violin Concerto No. 1 / Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk District
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16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Mendelssohn: Elias, Op. 70
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16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Stravinsky: Symphonie en 3 mouvements & Jeu de cartes
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16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Mendelssohn: Die großen Chorwerke
James Conlon, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Rafael Frühbeck de Burgos, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau
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Martinu, B.: Concertino for Piano Trio and String Orchestra, H. 231 and 232 / Rhapsody-Concerto / Memorial To Lidice
Gürzenich-Orchester Köln, Trio Wanderer, Tabea Zimmermann, James Conlon
Classical - Released by CapriccioNR on Jan 1, 2005
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Bruch: Symphonies Nos. 1 - 3
Gürzenich-Orchester Kölner Philharmoniker, James Conlon
Classical - Released by Warner Classics on Feb 28, 2003
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Stravinsky: Le Rossignol, Oedipus Rex & Renard
James Conlon, Franz Welser-Möst, Natalie Dessay, Marjana Lipovšek, Anthony rolfe Johnson
Classical - Released by Warner Classics on Oct 18, 1999
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Zemlinsky: Die Seejungfrau & Sinfonietta, Op. 23
James Conlon, Gürzenich-Orchester Köln
Classical - Released by Warner Classics on Jan 1, 1996
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Zemlinsky: Lyrische Symphonie, Op. 18 & Orchestral Preludes and Interludes
Classical - Released by Warner Classics on Sep 3, 2002
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Dett: The Ordering of Moses (Live)
May Festival Chorus, Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, James Conlon, Unknown Artist
Classical - Released by Bridge Records on May 6, 2016
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Berg, A.: Violin Concerto / Passacaglia / Lulu Suite
Vladimir Spivakov, Natalie Karl, Gürzenich-Orchester Köln, Ute Doring, James Conlon
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16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo -
Liszt: St. Stanislaus, S. 688
James Conlon, May Festival Chorus, Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra
Classical - Released by Telarc on Jan 27, 2004
16-Bit CD Quality 44.1 kHz - Stereo