The titan of the podium, who led the BSO at Symphony Hall 83 times and conducted 27 performances at Tanglewood, died on September 6th at the age of 95. Highlights of his career include leading the Cleveland Orchestra for almost 30 years (taking over a dozen international tours), several controversial but fantastic recordings, a significant relationship with London’s Philharmonia Orchestra beginning in 1994 and culminating with his appointment as Honorary Conductor for Life in 2008, and leadership of Oper Frankfurt for almost a decade.
BSO Vice President of Artistic Planning Anthony Fogg supported commissions of new works for Dohnányi to conduct, like Jean-Frédéric Neuburger’s Aube. He recalled the maestro’s work with the Orchestra at Symphony Hall and Tanglewood:
When Christoph von Dohnányi returned to the podium of the BSO in November 2002, it was, in effect, the beginning an important new relationship for the orchestra, not with an emerging talent but with one of the most distinguished conductors of our time, then at the peak of his powers.
Dohnányi’s manner was warm but ‘non-nonsense’ on the podium; rehearsals were always immensely detailed, with tireless attention to matters of intonation and balance. His programs were typically anchored by a major work from the Classical or Romantic periods, often combined with music by a major European figure: Henze or Ligeti or Lutoslawski or Birtwistle. But he also championed younger composers, including Thomas Adès, a performance of whose Asyla marked the beginning of the BSO’s rich engagement with Adès’s work over the subsequent 20 or so seasons.
Collaborating with the most prominent soloists of our time, he was also immensely generous to young artists, whom he frequently invited for a significant debut, guiding their preparation and performances with wisdom and collegiality. At Tanglewood in 2010, he memorably led a striking production of Strauss’s Ariadne auf Naxos with Tanglewood Music Center forces.
Those of us lucky to spend time socially with Christoph were dazzled by his insights into world history, philosophy, and, of course, everything about music. Phone conversations with him were never short and always entertaining: news of the latest opera production he’d seen, thoughts on current American or German politics, updates on his family and colleagues — all this flavored with humor and colorful self-deprecation.
A generous and supportive mentor, he encouraged other conductors (read Thomas Guggeis’s moving tribute HERE), directors (read Peter Mario Katona’s discussion of his influence in the world of opera HERE), and worked with teams of dramaturgs (at Oper Frankfurt) to infuse traditional elements into modernist theatrical presentations. He raised standards, motivated musicians, and expanded the repertory of every ensemble he led. He also leaves a physical legacy as the catalyst behind the $37m renovation of Cleveland’s 1931 Severance Hall, which reopened in January 2000.
Dohnányi was a child of two worlds. Born in Berlin in 1929 into a noble Hungarian family, he was a teenager when his father Hans and his uncle, the Lutheran pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer, gave their lives in the foiled assassination attempt of Hitler. Christoph intended to follow in his father’s footsteps as a lawyer, but said, “As I had a very quick mind and a good memory, I was able to listen to my law professor while composing music at the same time.” After World War II, he graduated from the Staatliche Hochschule für Musik in Munich, winning the 1951 Richard Strauss conducting prize, then crossed the Atlantic to work with his grandfather, Ernö von Dohnányi (1877-1960) at Florida State University and with Leonard Bernstein at Tanglewood.
A persuasive and moving speaker, especially when describing his family background and his connection to certain European composers, he revived works suppressed by the Nazis during his youth, such as Schreker’s Der ferne Klang (in Kassel) and Mendelssohn’s Elijah (in Cologne). He reminisced in a 2015 interview with WCRB’s Brian McCreath, :
Bartók was, for a while, a pupil of my grandfather and actually, they were very good friends later. And my grandfather was more on the conservative side, and Bartók was fortunately not on the conservative side. But there is a story that actually Bartók came to my grandfather and said, ‘I don’t know how to go on because I don’t know what to compose. There’s so much music there.’ And my grandfather said to him, ‘Go to Vienna. There’s a performance of Zarathustra by Strauss and listen to that.’ Then, of course, I went to visit my grandfather in the United States, where he taught in Tallahassee, Florida, for a while. And actually, we talked a lot about Bartók and this music [Music for Strings, Percussion, and Celesta], this piece we are doing. It’s one of the hardest pieces for the orchestra by Bartók.
McCreath pointed out that a gift was made to the BSO in memory of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and the conductor commented, “I think that’s wonderful […] because he was really […] a good musician, Dietrich Bonhoeffer. He was a very special sight-reading pianist. You know, he could really sight-read very well and was a musical man. And we did a lot of music together. And so it’s wonderful if he’s alive [through this donation to the BSO], combined with the music event.” He is survived by his third wife (violist Barbara Koller), his five children, and his brother Klaus.