Toledo Symphony

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About the Toledo Symphony

The Toledo Symphony has a rich history of serving northwest Ohio and southwest Michigan. In the past 67 years, the symphony has grown from a core group of 22 part-time musicians to a regional orchestra of nearly 80 professional musicians who consider it their primary employer.

With roots that go back to 1838, the symphony sees itself as the musical heart of the area, with neighborhood and regional concerts, a music school and two youth orchestras in addition to traditional concert offerings.

The symphony performs most concerts in the storied Peristyle at the Toledo Museum of Art, a historical gem built in 1933. Over the years, the flagship Classics Series at the Peristyle has drawn interest for its adventurous and challenging programming, a tribute to the vision of the symphony’s music directors and to the continuing curiosity of Toledo audiences. For many decades, the Toldeo Symphony has played a repertoire that is unusual for an orchestra in a city the size of Toledo, including debuts and premieres of works by such composers as Alban Berg and Edgar Varese; a program with the three major Stravinsky ballets; and a concert performance of Wagner’s Das Rheingold. Numerous world-class artists have performed with the Toledo Symphony, among them Isaac Stern, Benny Goodman, Jean Pierre Rampal, Glenn Gould, Vladimir Ashkenazy, Aaron Copland, Itzhak Perlman, Andre Watts, Maxim Shostakovich, Mstislav Rostropovich and Yo-Yo Ma. The Toledo Symphony has also welcomed generations of young emerging soloists, with notable performances in the ’80s and ’90s from violinists Midori, Joshua Bell, Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg and Hilary Hahn, as well as pianists Helene Grimaud, Simone Pedroni and Awadagin Pratt.

Recently, the Toledo Symphony established a School of Music that focuses on Suzuki instruction for strings and piano. This, combined with the management of the Toledo Youth Orchestras and the popular Family Series at the Peristyle, further strengthens the symphony’s commitment to music education. Since the mid 1970s, the Toledo Symphony has actively promoted a Neighborhood and Regional Concert series, whereby any community center, church or performance hall in the region may present the Symphony. The popular series consists of more than 35 performances annually in a huge geographic area, with some venues more than 100 miles from Toledo. These concerts are a vital part of the Toledo Symphony’s mission to be a truly regional orchestra. For more information, visit toledosymphony.com.

About Music Director Stefan Sanderling

Stefan Sanderling has quickly emerged as one of the leading German conductors of his generation. Since 2003, he has simultaneously served as Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor of the Toledo Symphony and Music Director of The Florida Orchestra and. In 2007, he was also appointed Music Director of the Chautauqua Symphony Orchestra.

Since his United States debut at the 1989 Tanglewood Summer Music Festival, Sanderling has led such prestigious North American orchestras as the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, Montreal Symphony Orchestra, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, Houston Symphony, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, and the orchestras of Indianapolis, Vancouver, Colorado, Salt Lake City and Ottawa. He has appeared as guest conductor with numerous ensembles in Europe, Asia and Australia, including the London Philharmonic, Philharmonia Orchestra, London Symphony, Royal Philharmonic, Scottish Chamber Orchestra, Bournemouth Symphony, Rotterdam Philharmonic, Vienna Radio Symphony, Prague Symphony, Staatskapelle Dresden, Berliner Staatskapelle, NDR Symphony Orchestra Hamburg, Berlin Symphony Orchestra, St. Petersburg Philharmonic, the Deutsche Oper Berlin, the Komische Oper Berlin, the Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra, the NHK Symphony of Tokyo and the Sydney Symphony Orchestra.

Sanderling’s numerous recordings include the complete Tchaikovsky Orchestral Suites, Stravinsky’s Pulcinella and Honegger’s symphonies and tone poems, all on the Naxos label. He has also completed several discs of works by the French composers Gretry, Gossec, Mehul and Ladmirault on the ASV and Arion label.

Stefan Sanderling was born in East Berlin in 1964, son of the legendary conductor Kurt Sanderling. He studied musicology at the University of Halle and conducting at the conservatory in Leipzig before continuing his studies at the University of Southern California. He was one of the youngest chief conductors in Germany, a position he held at the Brandenburgische Philharmonie and the Potsdam Opera. He went on to become Music Director and Chief Conductor of the Philharmonic Orchestra and Staatstheater in Mainz until 2001. From1997 and 2004, he also served as Music Director of the Orchestre de Bretagne in France.

About Conductor Jeffrey Pollock

Jeffrey Pollock, The Toledo Symphony’s Resident Conductor, is known for the musicality of his performances, his innovative concert programming and for his ability to make connections with audiences. In 2001, the League of American Orchestras featured him in their prestigious National Conductor Preview. Since then, Pollock has worked with orchestras all across North America, including the Houston, Nashville, Charlotte, Cleveland Chamber, Kitchener-Waterloo and Niagara symphony orchestras and has also given chamber orchestra performances with members of the Baltimore Symphony and the Tulsa Philharmonic. In addition, he has conducted at the Baltimore Opera Company, Opera Delaware and the Opera Company of North Carolina.

Born in San Diego, Pollock received his undergraduate degree from the University of California, Berkeley. He studied with Frederik Prausnitz at the Peabody Conservatory of Music, where he earned a master’s degree, and also worked with the noted conducting instructor Gustav Meier. Pollock made his conducting debut in San Francisco with the Amphion Ensemble, a chamber orchestra of which he was both founder and music director. From 2000 to 2003, he was Assistant Conductor of the North Carolina Symphony. While he was music director for the York Symphony Orchestra from 2004 to 2005, his non-traditional programming attracted new audiences and brought critical acclaim for the orchestra. As Associate Conductor of the Fort Worth Symphony (2005 to 2007), he created a series of sold-out family and education concerts and conducted a wide variety of concerts.

About Toledo, Ohio

Located at the busiest “intersection” in the country – Interstates 75 and 80 – and the confluence of the Maumee River and Lake Erie, Toledo, Ohio, is truly at the crossroads of America. The greater Toledo area is within a 500-mile radius of more than 93 million people – almost 40 percent of the North American population. Toledo has been in the forefront of industrial activity since its founding as a terminus of the Miami & Erie Canal, then as a key railway center between New York and Chicago, and later as a cornerstone of the automobile industry. Today, the city is reinventing itself as a center for new manufacturing, especially in the solar energy field.

Toledo is home to many diverse ethnic neighborhoods and is recognized for an entrepreneurial, hard-working ethos. It is home to the legendary triple-A Toledo Mud Hens Baseball Club, a fine system of Metroparks and the University of Toledo, a major university that focuses on scientific and medical innovation.

Early on, Toledo’s city leaders appreciated the importance of a vibrant cultural arts legacy. The Toledo Symphony and The Toledo Museum of Art, as well as a multitude of other arts organizations, continue to serve the region with ever-expanding roles in arts education and advocacy.