VIENNA (AFP) — Up and coming 28-year-old German conductor Cornelius Meister has been appointed the new chief conductor of the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra from September 2010, ORF public radio announced Friday.
Meister, born in Hanover in 1980, will take over from current French maestro Bertrand de Billy, whose contract expires at the end of August 2010, ORF said in a statement.
Meister is currently general music director in Heidelberg and de Billy, who decided not to renew his contract in a fight with ORF over the funding and status of the orchestra, described him as a "very special talent."
"I'm very pleased about the nomination. I will involve him with all important decisions with immediate effect. Cornelius can count on my fullest support," de Billy said.
Meister, GMD in Heidelberg since September 2005, worked for the first time with the Vienna Radio Symphony last summer.
"Vienna is a dream for me," he was quoted as saying in the ORF statement.
The orchestra "is one of the most exciting in the world. We got on like a house on fire from the word 'go'," he said.
The Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra is the Austrian capital's third orchestra after the Vienna Philharmonic and the Vienna Symphony Orchestra. One of its main specialities is modern and contemporary music.
But ORF has suggested spinning off the 40-year-old ensemble for cost reasons, plans that have come under heavy fire in Austria, particularly from de Billy, who was appointed in September 2002.
ORF head Alexander Wrabetz described Meister as a "young, but already very successful and respected conductor with substantial experience."
Meister is scheduled to conduct a concert with his new orchestra in Vienna's Konzerthaus in May 2010, before he officially takes over. He will also conduct a new production of Johann Strauss's operetta "Die Fledermaus" at the Theater an der Wien opera house in the summer of 2010.
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