Daniele Gatti conducts Stravinsky and Shostakovich

Igor Stravinsky combines in his ballet Apollon musagète the cheerful light atmosphere of the classical era with the easy-going, urban lifestyle of the 1920s. Dmitri Shostakovich, on the other hand, composed his Fifth Symphony in 19th-century aesthetics of sound, ostensibly as a homage to socialism. But his music has a certain ambiguity: “The rejoicing is forced under threat,” the composer wrote. “One would have to be a complete fool not to hear that.”

Daniele Gatti is music director of the Teatro dell’Opera di Roma and he holds the same position at the Orchestra Mozart Bologna. He is also artistic advisor of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra (MCO). Gatti is also a regular guest at renowned opera houses and orchestras, such as the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, the Leipzig Gewandhaus and the Orchestra Filarmonica della Scala. At the Salzburg Festival he conducted the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra in productions of the operas Elektra (2010), La Bohème (2012), Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg (2013) and Verdiʼs Il trovatore.
Gatti studied composition and conducting at the conservatory in his home town of Milan. He was musical director of the Orchestra dellʼAccademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, the Teatro Comunale in Bologna (1997 – 2007), the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (1996 – 2009) and principal guest conductor at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, as well as chief conductor of the Zurich Opera House. From 2008 until 2016, he has been responsible for the musical direction of the Orchestre National de France, and subsequently chief conductor of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra until 2018. For his work with the Orchestre National de France., the French Republic named him “Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur”. Daniele Gatti first conducted the Berliner Philharmoniker in April 1997 in works by Berlioz, Liszt and Bartók; in his last concerts with the orchestra in September 2017 the programme included symphonies by Hindemith and Brahms.