Antonio Pappano

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Antonio Pappano (born 30 December 1959 in London, England) is a British conductor. He has been the music director for the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden since 2002.

His appointment was announced in 1999 when he was only 40. Despite his Italian name, family origins near Naples, and his American upbringing, he is British. He was previously music director of La Monnaie, the Belgian Royal Opera House, a post he held from the age of 32 and where he was succeeded by the young Japanese conductor, Kazushi Ono.

Recently he has been working his way through the operas that are part of Der Ring des Nibelungen by Richard Wagner, with stars that have included Plácido Domingo, but, with the Covent Garden orchestra and chorus, he has also conducted a new David McVicar staging of Mozart's Le Nozze di Figaro from the harpsichord to widespread acclaim. His reputation as accessible yet charismatic and as someone who can work with even the most prima of donnas is helping him to build a formidable reputation in London and the opera world.

Antonio Pappano is the youngest conductor to lead London's prestigious opera (and ballet) orchestra and chorus. As well as directing the Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie, he was previously director of the Den Norske Opera (Norwegian National Opera) where his role as Sjefdirigent has been taken by Olaf Henzold. He has also been principal guest conductor of the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. As a pianist, he was a rehearsal accompanist at the New York City Opera by the age of 21, after his family moved to Connecticut, USA when he was 13. As a pianist as well as a conductor, he attracted the attention of fellow pianist and conductor Daniel Barenboim, whose assistant he became at the Bayreuth Festival. He has also conducted at the English National Opera (ENO), the San Francisco Opera, the Lyric Opera of Chicago and the Berlin State Opera (Berlin Staatsoper).

Antonio Pappano is also Music Director of the orchestra of the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome in his parents' homeland Italy (he was born in Epping, near London) and conducts regularly with the London Symphony Orchestra, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra and the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra.

[edit] References

Maeckelbergh, Lucrèce. Antonio Pappano: Con Passione. Snoeck, September 2006, ISBN 9053495274.

[edit] External links

Preceded by: Bernard Haitink	Musical Directors, Royal Opera House, Covent Garden 2002–	Succeeded by: incumbent
Preceded by: Myung-Whun Chung	Principal Conductors, Orchestra dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia 2005–	Succeeded by: incumbent