Constantine Orbelian

Constantine Orbelian stands out as one of the rare conductors who built thriving careers simultaneously in the United States and Russia, although he launched his professional life as a pianist. Born in San Francisco on August 27, 1956, to immigrant parents—an Armenian father and a Ukrainian mother—he grew up in a household steeped in music, with his father’s brother recognized as a leading Armenian composer. From childhood he mingled with visiting luminaries such as Sviatoslav Richter, Emil Gilels, and Vladimir Ashkenazy, began piano studies early, and gave public recitals by age five. At eleven he made his first appearance with the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra.

His American training included work with Alexander Lieberman, after which a scholarship took him to Armenia, then part of the Soviet Union, and to Moscow for lessons with Anaida Sumbatian—one of the few Americans permitted such study before the Soviet collapse. Back in the United States he continued at the Juilliard School in New York with Nina Svetlanova and Nadia Reisenberg, completing his degree in 1980. Throughout the 1980s he maintained an active concert career, performing with the Boston Symphony, Detroit Symphony, and Moscow State Symphony Orchestras, and in 1987 recorded Khachaturian’s Piano Concerto with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra under Neeme Järvi.

Occasional conducting from the keyboard drew the notice of the Moscow Chamber Orchestra after the sudden death of its conductor, Andrei Korsakov. In 1991 Orbelian was named its music director, becoming the first American to lead a major Russian ensemble. The following year he and his wife, violinist Maria Safariants, established the Palaces of St. Petersburg Festival. Their partnership with the Delos label began in 1999 with an album of tangos by Astor Piazzolla, initiating a long recording association. Several American tours followed, and in 2004 President Vladimir Putin awarded him the title Honored Artist of Russia—the first non-Russian recipient. Orbelian later served as music director of the Philharmonia of Russia and, beginning in 2014, of the Kaunas City Symphony Orchestra in Lithuania, while also holding the post of permanent guest conductor with the Moscow Philharmonic.

He has issued some sixty albums of orchestral and operatic repertoire, many with the Moscow Chamber Orchestra and the Kaunas City Symphony Orchestra; the latter collaboration yielded a 2021 recording of Bellini’s I Puritani featuring an international cast of singers. That same year he was appointed music director and principal conductor of the New York City Opera.