Kazem Abdullah

Conductors

Manager: Tim Fox
Management Territory: Worldwide

About

Maestro Kazem Abdullah is quickly becoming one of the most watched young American conductors on the scene today. In the 2009-2010 season, Kazem Abdullah conducted the internationally renowned Orquestra de São Paulo, one of Brazil’s most celebrated classical music ensembles, during its return to the United States for the orchestra’s third coast-to-coast tour. Mr. Abdullah’s other projects included sold-out performances of Treemonisha at the Théâtre du Châtelet de Paris and debuts with the Chicago Sinfonietta, Huntsville Symphony, Dayton Philharmonic and the Staatskapelle Weimar. Moreover, Mr. . . . Abdullah was named #4 on the Daily Beast’s list of “Young Rock Stars of the Conducting World.”

A significant highlight of Mr. Abdullah’s 2008-2009 season included a highly anticipated debut with the Metropolitan Opera where he conducted Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice, a feat that was lauded by the New York Times as “...a confident performance - impressively responsive to the singers during their long stretches of orchestra-accompanied recitative - a combination of urgency and flexibility." Other highlights of the season included debuts with the Mexico City Philharmonic, Oregon Symphony, and the Indianapolis Symphony where he led the world premiere of Gabriela Frank’s Peregrinos. Mr. Abdullah was also invited by Michael Tilson-Thomas to conduct the New World Symphony in its 2009 Ives Festival.

Mr. Abdullah served as an Assistant and Cover Conductor at the Metropolitan Opera from 2006 to 2009. He assisted and worked with many conductors including Louis Langree, Kirill Petrenko, Lorin Maazel and James Levine. He prepared productions of Lulu, Ariadne auf Naxos, Der Ring des Nibelungen, Idomeneo, Die Zauberflöte, Don Giovanni, Cosi fan Tutte, Iphigénie en Tauride, and Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice.

Kazem Abdullah’s additional conducting credits include the National Arts Center Orchestra of Ottawa, Chautauqua Music School Festival Orchestra, Berliner Kammerphilharmonie, Finnish Radio Orchestra, Helsinki Philharmonic, and the Tanglewood Music Center Orchestra where he substituted on very short notice to conduct performances of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas in collaboration with the Mark Morris Dance Group.

Mr. Abdullah began his music studies at the age of ten and later graduated from the Cincinnati Conservatory of Music in 2000, and subsequently studied at the University of Southern California. He originally trained as a clarinetist and has appeared as a soloist with the Cincinnati Symphony, National Symphony, and the New World Symphony. His conducting teachers and coaches included Jorma Panula, Gustav Meier, Markand Thakar, Stefan Asbury, Bernard Haitink and James Levine.

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