Roberto Abbado

Renowned in both the operatic and symphonic realms, conductor Roberto Abbado has forged a particularly notable path within American concert halls. Born in Milan, Italy, on December 30, 1954, he belongs to a multi-generational musical lineage that includes his uncle, conductor Claudio Abbado. His training began with Mario Gusella in Milan, continued at Teatro La Fenice in Venice and the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome under Franco Ferrara—where he became the first student invited to lead the Orchestra dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia—and also encompassed piano and composition studies at the Milan Conservatory. He completed his formation by attending the final summer course offered by Hans Swarowsky in Vienna in 1975.

At age 23, Abbado led a production of Verdi's Simon Boccanegra in Macerata; in December 1979 he made his first appearance at La Fenice with a new staging of Rossini's Il Turco in Italia. These engagements launched an international operatic career that soon encompassed La Scala in Milan, the Vienna State Opera, La Fenice again, and the Deutsche Oper Berlin. Between 1988 and 1991 he served as chief conductor of the Münchner Rundfunkorchester and has maintained an ongoing relationship with the ensemble.

Although his 1994 debut at New York's Metropolitan Opera signaled growing transatlantic activity, Abbado's American work has centered chiefly on orchestral engagements with the Boston Symphony, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic, and the Chicago Symphony. In Europe he has likewise concentrated on symphonic repertoire, beginning with a 1992 recording of Liszt piano concertos alongside Gerhard Oppitz and the Bamberger Symphoniker. He has also produced several opera recordings for RCA, among them a 2011 account of Bellini's I Capuleti e i Montecchi with the Münchner Rundfunkorchester. Since 2015 he has shared music directorship of the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofia in Valencia, Spain, with Fabio Biondi; in 2018 he assumed the music directorship of the Festival Verdi in Parma, Italy. His discography further includes releases on Decca and Deutsche Grammophon, as well as, from the late 2010s onward, the Dynamic label, which issued his 2022 album Vive Verdi!: French Rarities and Discoveries with the Orchestra del Teatro Comunale di Bologna.