This past week Mariss Jansons, 71, announced his resignation from the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, effective at the end of next season. Jansons has been the chief conductor of the RCO since 2004, and only the 6th chief conductor of this great orchestra in its long and illustrious history.
Jansons has had major health problems since at least 1996 when he suffered a serious heart attack. In recent years he has cut back his long distance travel and limited his conducting to just a handful of orchestras, all of them in Europe.
Jansons was born in Latvia but grew up in St. Petersburg (formerly called Leningrad). His father, Arvid Jansons was assistant conductor to Mravinsky with the Leningrad Philharmonic. Mariss Jansons still uses St. Petersburg as his home base although he rarely does any conducting there.
At various times in the course of his career Mariss Jansons has been chief conductor of the Oslo Philharmonic and the Pittsburg Symphony.
Jansons is currently the music director of the Bavarian Radio Symphony in Munich and after leaving the RCO he will retain that position.
In the video Jansons conducts the final part of Mahler’s Symphony No. 3 with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra.
Paul E. Robinson
