Leon Botstein has been named music director of the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra (JSO), according to a press representative for the conductor.
Botstein, the music director of the American Symphony Orchestra, has signed a three-year contract starting this fall. The JSO has been without a music director since the departure of David Shalon in 2000, just before his death, though Lawrence Foster served as musical advisor until last year.
The JSO has struggled with serious financial problems, and it shut down in February after its funders, the city of Jerusalem, Israel Broadcast Authority and Israeli Ministry of Culture, withheld a loan because of allegations of financial wrongdoing. The JSO board has since resigned and the orchestra has been put into the hands of a court-appointed receiver.
According to Botstein's representative, the conductor has met with Jerusalem Mayor Uri Lupolianski and Ehud Olmert, who as Minister of Trade and Industry oversees the Broadcast Authority, and received their commitment to continued funding for the JSO.
Botstein is known as a polymath — he is a scholar and the president of Bard College, where he founded the Bard Music Festival — and for innovative, often multi-disciplinary programming.
JSO musicians, who circulated a petition in support of Botstein's candidacy,
have welcomed his appointment. "After years of not having a clear musical
director, my colleagues in the orchestra are thrilled with the creative and
inspiring approach Leon brings to classical music," said bassoonist Richard
Paley in a statement.
