Claudio Abbado was born into a family of musicians in Milan. He studied piano, conducting, and composition at the Milan Conservatory. After completing his degree, he moved to Vienna, where he studied under Hans Swarowsky at the Vienna Music Academy. He won the Koussevitzky Prize in Tanglewood in 1958 and received the first prize at the Mitropoulos Competition in New York in 1963, which earned him the position of assistant to Leonard Bernstein. Herbert von Karajan invited Abbado to the Salzburg Festival in 1965, where he conducted the Vienna Philharmonic. In the following year, he made his debut with the Berlin Philharmonic. From 1968 to 1986, Abbado was musical director of La Scala in Milan, where he established his reputation as an innovator keen to promote contemporary music and director’s theater. He is also widely acclaimed for having opened the venue to a more-diverse audience. During his time at La Scala, Abbado’s international career also flourished. He was chief conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra from 1979 to 1988, directed the Vienna State Opera for five years starting in 1986, and was appointed by the Berlin Philharmonic to be its director in 1989. In 1994 the orchestra entrusted Abbado with leadership of the Salzburg Easter Festival. After leaving Berlin in 2002, Abbado formed the LUCERNE FESTIVAL ORCHESTRA, which has played here every year since 2003. Encouraging young musical talent is a cause close to Abbado’s heart. In 1978, he was one of the founders of the European Community Youth Orchestra and later helped to set up the Chamber Orchestra of Europe. In 1986, he launched the Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra and, in 2004, the Orchestra Mozart. Among the numerous distinctions Abbado has received are the Siemens Music Prize (1994) and the Praemium Imperiale (2003).
LUCERNE FESTIVAL (IMF) debut on August 20, 1966, with the Swiss Festival Orchestra, playing pieces by Hindemith, Sibelius, and Mendelssohn.
May 2010