Conductor Herbert Blomstedt has died at the age of 99. His career spanned seven extraordinary decades and he continued directing and touring until the late 1990s; his last concert took place earlier this year, at the age of 98.
Born in Massachusetts, USA, in July 1927 to Swedish parents, the musician grew up in Sweden and Finland. His conducting teachers included Igor Markevitch, Jean Morel and Leonard Bernstein.
He made his conducting debut with the Stockholm Philharmonic in 1954. Subsequent positions included principal conductor of the Oslo Philharmonic (1962-68) and a decade in the same role with the Danish Radio Symphony Orchestra (1967-77). He conducted the Staatskapelle Dresden from 1975 to 1985 and was music director of the San Francisco Symphony from 1985 to 1995.
He worked with the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra from 1998 to 2005 and, over the last two decades of his life, developed a close relationship with the London Philharmonia, conducting the orchestra for the first time in 2006 at the Edinburgh Festival. His last appearance in London was in November 2024 to conduct Mahler’s last completed symphony, the Ninth. “Conducting an orchestra at 97 is exceptional. Conducting Mahler’s Ninth Symphony at 97 is unprecedented,” Martin Kettle of the Guardian wrote at the time. “(But) let’s put Blomstedt’s age aside for a moment: this performance required no special pleading. Yes, it took a while to get into his irresistible stride, and the Landler the second movement briefly lost momentum. But the surging rondo was terribly lively and the final adagio Olympian. It was one of the most beautiful Mahler ninths one can hear.
Blomstedt’s last concert conducted took place in May in San Francisco, where he was conductor laureate of the symphony orchestra. However, he was very fragile and his performance (also of Mahler 9) had to be temporarily interrupted after collapsing in the third movement.
His biographical page on the San Francisco Symphony’s website states that he was: “Noble, charming, restrained, modest. Such qualities… are rather atypical for extraordinary personalities such as conductors… Herbert Blomstedt is an exception, precisely because he possesses those very qualities which apparently have so little to do with a conductor’s claim to power.”
In addition to the relationship with the San Francisco Symphony, Blomstedt has been honorary conductor of the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra, the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, the Danish National Symphony Orchestra, the NHK Tokyo Symphony Orchestra, the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Dresden Staatskapelle, the Oslo Philharmonic and the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra.
Blomstedt was an invigorating presence on the podium well into his 10th decade. “Blomstedt’s enthusiasm for music-making is as irrepressible as ever,” wrote Andrew Clements, in a review of him in 2019. “His program consisted of two symphonies…which he must have conducted countless times before during his 60-year career, but there was no trace of routine in either performance. »
The conductor was one of the world’s leading interpreters of the music of Beethoven, Brahms, Mendelssohn and Bruckner. His Sibelius and Nielsen symphonic cycles were particularly appreciated. Among the awards and honors he received were two Grammys and a Gramophone Award, and earlier this fall he was named a Praemium Imperiale winner.
He died at his home in Gothenburg, Sweden. Lothar Schacke, Blomstedt’s director for almost four decades, said in a statement: “The loss of Herbert Blomstedt fills me and my colleagues with deep grief. Every encounter with him was a gift, his kindness, knowledge, wisdom and gentle humor enriching us intellectually and emotionally.”
Gn entert
