Gustav Meier

Gustav Meier has been acclaimed in the music world as an outstanding conductor and truly gifted teacher. From 1980 to 1996 Meier spent summer overseeing Tanglewood's prestigious Conductors Seminar. The program selected the "absolute cream" of international students according to Andre Previn, a frequent guest in Meier's classes, along with the late Leonard Bernstein. Meier's original connection with Tanglewood dates to 1957 and '58 when he himself was chosen as a conducting fellow and won top prizes. (He was a member of one of the most remarkable classes in Tanglewood's history that include Claudio Abbado, Zubin Mehta and David Zinman.)

After graduating from the Zurich Conservatory, the Swiss-born conductor continued his studies at the Academia Chigiana Siena. He began his career at the Lucerne Opera, followed by several seasons at the Vienna Chamber Opera and the Zurich Opera. In this country his opera talents were quickly recognized, as he was soon conducting at the New York, Santa Fe, Miami, Minnesota, San Francisco Operas and others.

Gustav Meier is Music Director of the Greater Lansing Symphony Orchestra in Michigan and the Greater Bridgeport Symphony Orchestra in Connecticut. He appears regularly as guest conductor in Europe, South and Central America and throughout the United States.

Meier's academic appointments have included the Yale School of Music, where he became the youngest full professor in its history, the Eastman School of Music and the University of Michigan (AnnArbor). Harvard University honored Gustav Meier with the Luise Vosgerian Teaching Award for his "outstanding teaching abilities and high level of artistic accomplishments.

Innovative artistic direction has earned Meier critical praises in this country and abroad. Productions which received nationwide coverage included Stravinsky Rake's Progress in which he collaborated with the film director Rober Altman (M.A.S.H., Nashville, The Players), William Bolcom's Songs of Innocence and Experience, which he conducted in Ann Arbor (American premiere) and at Chicago's Grant Park, and Andre Previn's All Good Boys Deserve Favour, a play by Tom Stoppard set for actors and symphony orchestra.

Recent conducting engagements include subscription concerts with the Colorado and the Quad City Symphony Orchestras. He was also appointed artistic advisor to the Birmingham, Alabama Symphony Orchestra as of last fall. Future guest engagements include subscription concerts with China's National Symphony Orchestra, the Alabama, Tallahassee, Florida West Coast and Hamilton (Ontario) Symphony Orchestras. In 1996 Gustav Meier was awarded the Ditson Prize which recognizes a commitment to consistently perform works of American composers