Gilbert Levine
He studied bassoon with Stephen Maxym and Sherman Walt, piano with Gilbert Kalish, Music History with Lewis Lockwood and Arthur Mendel, Music Theory with Edward T. Cone, Peter Westergaard and Milton Babbitt, ear training and score reading with Nadia Boulanger, Renée Longy, and Luise Vosgerchian, and conducting with Jacques-Louis Monod and Franco Ferrara.
His appointment was initially controversial because of the general consensus that Krzysztof Penderecki forced the choice of Levine on the orchestra.
Under Levine, the Kraków Philharmonic also performed for the first time with such soloists as Emanuel Ax, Garrick Ohlsson, and Shlomo Mintz.
[13] Featured guest artists were Lynn Harrell and Richard Dreyfuss, who narrated an excerpt from Leonard Bernstein's Third Symphony (Kaddish).
In 1998, Levine led members of the Los Angeles Philharmonic and, with the special permission of Pope John Paul II, the ancient Capella Giulia Choir of St. Peter's Basilica, in concerts to commemorate the 200th Anniversary of the founding of Mission San Luis Rey in California.
In 1994, for his services to the Pope and to the Vatican, he was invested as a Knight Commander of the Pontifical Equestrian Order of St. Gregory the Great (KCSG), the highest Papal knighthood accorded to a non-ecclesiastical musician since Mozart.
The other is Riccardo Muti, Music Director of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, who received that honor from Pope Benedict XVI in 2012.
In this capacity he toured America and Europe, performing Haydn's The Creation in televised concerts in Baltimore, London, and Rome.
[23][24][15] He led the London Philharmonic Orchestra (LPO) in 2003, conducting selections from Verdi and Mozart on ABC's "Good Morning America" in a historic first for that program.
In November of that same year, Levine directed the Orchestra of Saint Luke's and the Morgan State University Choir in a concert entitled "Rejoice in this Land", which included Beethoven's Ninth Symphony and the world premiere of Washington Speaks by Richard Danielpour, with Ted Koppel as narrator.
The program included Bogurodzica (an ancient Polish hymn), Edward T. Cone Psalm 91 (1948), Bach Magnificat in D, and Beethoven Symphony No.
[28][29] On May 5, 2014, Levine led the Orchestra of Saint Luke's, the Kraków Philharmonic Choir and the Choral Arts Society of Washington in "Peace Through Music: In Our Age," a musical celebration of the Canonizations of Popes John XXIII and John Paul II, at Constitution Hall in Washington, D.C.[30] The concert included performances of Copland Fanfare for the Common Man, Verdi Messa di Requiem (Sanctus), Górecki Totus Tuus, Bernstein Chichester Psalms and Brahms First Symphony.
The concert was sponsored by the Embassies of Poland, Italy, Argentina and the Holy See to the U.S., the Catholic Archdiocese of Washington, Georgetown University, and WETA.
In addition to his appearance on "Good Morning America," and his numerous performances on European television, the CBS newsmagazine 60 Minutes featured a profile of him titled "The Pope's Maestro".
[33] Other stories about him have been featured on such programs as CBS Evening News, CBS Sunday Morning (on which he was profiled by Eugenia Zukerman), ABC World News Tonight, Nightline (ABC), Larry King Live (CNN),[34] and The Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer (CNN).
[38] Publishers Weekly wrote of The Pope's Maestro, "Not all books are worth writing; this one assuredly is, because it tells how peace can happen, one heart at a time."
[39] In 2017, the Lewis Center for the Arts at Princeton University commissioned a video profile of Sir Gilbert Levine.
