Minnesota Orchestra
The Minnesota Orchestra is an American orchestra based in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Founded originally as the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra in 1903, the Minnesota Orchestra plays most of its concerts at Minneapolis's Orchestra Hall.
Minnesota Orchestra
Recordings[edit]
The orchestra first began recording (by the acoustical process) under Henri Verbrugghen in 1924 for Brunswick, and in the following years produced some landmark records. Among these was the first electrical recording of Mahler's Resurrection Symphony with Eugene Ormandy, who recorded extensively with the orchestra for RCA Victor in the 1930s. In the 1940s, the Minneapolis Symphony was contracted to Columbia Records and made a series of records with Ormandy's successor, Dimitri Mitropoulos. These included the premiere recording of Mahler's First Symphony. Beginning in 1954 and continuing on through 1955, the group made the first complete recordings of Tchaikovsky's three ballets: Swan Lake, Sleeping Beauty, and The Nutcracker under the baton of Antal Doráti. In 1954, they also made the first recording of Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture to include actual cannon fire, again under Doráti's direction. These recordings were made for Mercury Records as part of the Living Presence series.
In the 1970s, the renamed Minnesota Orchestra made a series of recordings for Vox Records under the direction of Stanisław Skrowaczewski. In the 1990s and 2000s, the orchestra recorded for the Reference Recordings label under the direction of music director Eiji Oue, winning a Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Classical Composition in 2003 with Casa Guidi. More recently, Osmo Vänskä conducted a cycle of the Beethoven symphonies and a cycle of the Sibelius symphonies, both for the Swedish label BIS. Their recording of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, with the Minnesota Chorale, was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Orchestral Performance in 2007,[23] as was their recording of Sibelius's Second and Fifth Symphonies in 2012.[24] On January 26, 2014, the Minnesota Orchestra and Vänskä won the Grammy Award for Best Orchestral Performance for their recording of Sibelius's 1st and 4th symphonies.[25] In August 2017, the orchestra released a recording of Mahler's Fifth Symphony, starting a cycle of the Mahler symphonies. In November 2017, that recording was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Orchestral Performance.[26]
Summer festival[edit]
Begun in 1980 with Leonard Slatkin at the helm, the orchestra's summer festival has been known by several names, beginning with "Viennese Sommerfest," changing to "MusicFest" in 2001, and eventually reverting to "Sommerfest" in 2003. Sommerfest concerts are held at Orchestra Hall over a four-week period in midsummer. The orchestra also offers free live music on the plaza before and after each show, in genres varying from folk to jazz to polka. Slatkin was Artistic Director of Sommerfest from 1980 to 1989. Andrew Litton was the festival's Artistic Director from 2003 to 2017.[27]
The orchestra's "creative partner for summer programming" is Jon Kimura Parker, whom the orchestra named to the post in 2019. In July 2022, the orchestra announced an extension to Parker's summer programming contract through August 2024.[28]