Maestro Eckart Preu, Music Driector of the Stamford Symphony, talked to me in the Founder's Room at the Palace Theatre in Stamford. The interview is now playing on Cablevision Channel 88 on Tuesday November 1st at 9:00pm and Thursday November 3rd, at 5:30pm. It will play on Tuesday and Thursdays at the above times until the end of November.
I enjoyed talking to Mr. Preu because he brings the same passion, full attention and animation to an interview as he does in his conducting of an orchestra.
About the Maestro:
Eckart Preu was named Music Director of the Stamford Symphony in 2005. He is also Music Director of the Spokane Symphony.
He was previously Associate Conductor of the Richmond Symphony and Resident Conductor of the American Symphony Orchestra and of the American Russian Young Artists Orchestra. His other former posts include Music Director of the Norwalk (CT) Youth Symphony and Principal Conductor of the New Amsterdam Symphony (NY). He was associated with the Bard Music Festival from 1997 to 2004 as both Assistant and Guest Conductor.
Eckart Preu served as Music Director of the Orchestre International de Paris from 1993-1995. He has appeared as a guest conductor with the Jerusalem Symphony, Radio Philharmonic of Slovenia, Hungary’s Pecs Philharmonic, Bulgaria’s Varna Philharmonic, and Germany’s Jenaer Philharmoniker, Hallesche Philharmonic, Thüringer Kammerorchester, and Landessinfonieorchester Gotha.
Career highlights include two Carnegie Hall performances, a performance at the Sorbonne in Paris, and a live broadcast with the Jerusalem Symphony in 2005. He also conducted the Stamford Symphony in the world and New York premieres of Clarinet Concerto no. 4 by William Thomas McKinley, with soloist Richard Stoltzman. He has worked with internationally renowned soloists including Sarah Chang, Anne Akiko Meyers, Jean-Philippe Collard, Vladimir Feltsman, Horacio Gutierrez, Leila Josefowicz, and Louis Lortie.
A native of Germany, Eckart Preu received early musical training in piano and voice. At 10, he joined the Boys Choir Dresdner Kreuzchor, and went on to become a soloist, rehearsal pianist, and the choir’s Assistant Conductor. He subsequently served as vocal coach with the Altenburg Opera and the Erfurt Opera House in Germany.
Maestro Preu studied at the Hochschule für Musik in Weimar, where he earned a masters degree in conducting, and at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique in Paris. He came to the United States in 1996 as winner of the National Conducting Competition of the German Academic Exchange Service for graduate studies with Harold Farberman at the Hartt School of Music, where he also received the Karl Boehm Scholarship. In 1998, he took third place at the International Competition for Young Conductors of the European Union in Spoleto, Italy.
Eckart Preu has been a Visiting Assistant Professor at Bard College in New York, as well as a member of the guest faculty of the C.W. Post Chamber Music Festival
