About
MUSIC DIRECTOR DESIGNATE OF RHODE ISLAND PHILHARMONIC
Ruth Reinhardt is the newly appointed music director of the Rhode Island Philharmonic, commencing with the 25-26 season, the fifth in the orchestra’s 80-year history, and serves as music director designate in the 24-25 season.
In 24-25 Ms. Reinhardt will conduct orchestras on four continents – Europe, North America, and makes her debuts in Asia with both the Seoul Philharmonic and Hong Philharmonic, as well as in South America with the São Paulo State Symphony Orchestra (OSESP). She begins the season at the Lucerne Festival conducting a program dedicated to and celebrating the centennial of Pierre Boulez with the Lucerne Festival Contemporary Orchestra, and includes debuts with symphony orchestras in Bamberg, Nuremberg, Beethovenhalle in Bonn, Netherlands Radio Philharmonic, and the Residentie Orchester in the Hague, along with return visits to the RSB Berlin, and Stockholm (Philharmonic) and Malmö Sweden. In the US, Ms. Reinhard will conduct the Rhode Island Philharmonic, and make debut appearances with the St Louis Symphony and Charlotte Symphony and return engagements with the Milwaukee and San Diego symphony orchestras.
Programmatically, Reinhardt’s interests have led her toward an in-depth exploration of contemporary repertoire, leading the symphonic and orchestral world into the 21st century. Strongly centered on European composers, with significant emphasis on women composers of the second half of the 20th century and early 21st century, she brings new names and fresh faces to many orchestras for the first time. Among those whose works appear often in her progams are Grażyna Bacewicz, Kaija Saariaho, Lotta Wennäkoski, Daniel Bjarnason, Dai Fujikura, and Thomas Adès. Parallel programming can be complementary or contrasting, from the classic moderns such as Lutosławski, Bartok, Stravinsky, and Hindemith, or core composers of the symphonic canon – e.g. Brahms, Rachmaninoff, Dvorak.
In recent seasons, Ruth Reinhardt has made an important series of symphonic debuts in North America with the New York Philharmonic, Cleveland Orchestra, and symphony orchestras of San Francisco, Detroit, Houston, Baltimore, Milwaukee, and Seattle. In Europe, her appearances have been no less impressive – the Orchestre National de France, Frankfurt Radio Symphony, Tonkünstler Orchestra, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, and Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra (RSB), to name several.
Born in Saarbrucken Germany into a medical family – both parents and her sister are physicians – Reinhardt knew early that music would be her calling, sand studied violin and composition, writing an opera while still in high school. Her studies took her first to the Zürcher Hochschule der Künste, violin with Rudolf Koelman and conducting with Constantin Trinks and Johannes Schlaefli, and continued at The Juilliard School of Music in the conducting class of Alan Gilbert and James Ross. Upon graduation she joined the Dallas Symphony for two seasons, as assistant conductor to Jaap van Zweden, and was simultaneously a Dudamel Fellow of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and in summer was assistant conductor to the Luzern Festival Academy to artistic co-directors Wolfgang Rihm and Matthias Pintscher. Previous fellowships include the Seattle Symphony (2015-2016) and Tanglewood Music Center (2015), and Taki Concordia associate conducting fellow (2015-2017). Ruth Reinhardt currently resides in Switzerland.
