Dimitri Mitropoulos

Dimitri Mitropoulos was a Greek and American conductor, pianist, and composer. He was musically precocious, demonstrating his abilities at an early age. He composed his first opera, Soeur Béatrice, based on the play by Maurice Maeterlinck, when he was 23 years old. He studied music at the Athens Conservatoire as well as in Brussels and Berlin, with Ferruccio Busoni among his teachers. He became known for his performances of 20th-century works, especially those of the Second Viennese School. He also championed the symphonies of Gustav Mahler and made the first recording of Alban Berg's Wozzeck. He was one of the first conductors to conduct from the piano, often playing the solo part of piano concertos by Prokofiev, Rachmaninoff, and others. He had a photographic memory that enabled him to conduct without a score, even during rehearsals. He made his U.S. debut in 1936 with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, and he later settled in the country, becoming a citizen in 1946. From 1937 to 1949 he served as principal conductor of the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra. In 1949 he began his association with the New York Philharmonic, where he was initially co-conductor with Leopold Stokowski and became the sole music director in 1951. He recorded extensively with the Philharmonic for Columbia Records and sought to reach new audiences in the city through appearances on television and by conducting a week of performances at the Roxy Theatre, a popular movie theatre. He also served as principal conductor and pianist of the Metropolitan Opera in New York from 1954 to 1960, where he led acclaimed productions of Verdi's Un ballo in maschera, Mussorgsky's Boris Godunov, and Barber's Vanessa. He was a mentor and inspiration to Leonard Bernstein, who succeeded him as the conductor of the New York Philharmonic in 1958. He also influenced Herbert von Karajan, who invited him to conduct at the Salzburg Festival in the last years of his life. He died in Milan, Italy at the age of 64 of heart failure, while rehearsing Mahler's Third Symphony at the La Scala Opera House. He was buried in the First Cemetery of Athens, where his tombstone bears the inscription "Only life suffered can transform a symphony from a collection of notes into a message of humanity."