"Colorado Symphony targeting younger audiences with new music director"

(Photo by Roger Mastroianni)

The Denver Post has published an article about Brett Mitchell's appointment as Music Director of the Colorado Symphony:

Nothing underscores the Colorado Symphony Orchestra’s current approach to the business of making music more clearly than the appointment of Brett Mitchell as its new music director.

The orchestra is aggressively targeting younger audiences who like their classical infused with significant doses of pop. At 37 years old, and with an open mind toward the kind of fare that counts as symphonic, Mitchell fits right in.

The new hire is a considerable departure from the CSO’s past practices. Mitchell’s predecessor, Andrew Litton, is two nearly decades older and arrived four years ago with great fanfare and a detailed résumé, full of lead appointments and conducting jobs at major orchestras around the world. He was well established in the industry and had good connections with top-tier musicians and recording label executives.

Mitchell is coming in from Cleveland where he has two supporting positions, as the Cleveland Orchestra’s associate conductor and as music director of the organization’s Youth Orchestra. In Denver, he’ll lead an artistic team that also includes 26-year-old Associate Conductor Christopher Dragon and 31-year-old Assistant Conductor Andres Lopera.

Youth brings with it a certain freshness the orchestra hopes to project, and it links easily with a programming routine that places equal emphasis on the new and the old...

There are other bits of strategy wrapped up in the appointment. The CSO wanted a maestro who would relocate to Denver and Mitchell is pledged to spend at least half the year here conducting a large number of concerts...

And regardless of the level of talent — and Mitchell appears to have plenty of it — young conductors come with a relatively low price tag.

“I think this is a deal that will resonate well with the budget, but also resonate well with the musicians,” said Jerry Kern, who is both CEO and co-chair of the board of trustees.

To read the complete article, please click here.