Angel Gil-Ordóñez
Angel Gil-Ordóñez has attained an outstanding reputation among Spain's new generation of conductors as he carries on the tradition of his teacher and mentor, Sergiu Celibidache. The Washington Post has praised his conducting as "mesmerizing" and "as colorfully textured as a fauvist painting."The former Associate Conductor of the National Symphony Orchestra of Spain, Mr. Gil-Ordóñez has conducted symphonic music, opera and ballet throughout Europe, the United States and Latin America. In the United States he has appeared with the American Composers Orchestra, Opera Colorado, the Pacific Symphony, the Hartford Symphony, the Brooklyn Philharmonic at the Brooklyn Academy of Music, and led the opening concert of the National Gallery Orchestra in Washington last season. Abroad, he has been heard with the Munich Philharmonic, the Solistes de Berne, at the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival, and at the Bellas Artes National Theatre in Mexico City. In summer 2000 he toured the major music festivals of Spain with the Valencia Symphony Orchestra in the Spanish premiere of Leonard Bernstein's Mass.
A specialist in the Spanish repertoire, Mr. Gil-Ordóñez has recorded four CDs devoted to Spanish composers with the Radio and Television Symphony Orchestra of Spain, the Madrid Symphony Orchestra, the Galicia Symphony Orchestra and the Camara XXI chamber orchestra.
Born in Madrid, he worked closely with Sergiu Celibidache for more than six years in Germany. He also studied with Pierre Boulez and Iannis Xenakis in France. Currently the Music Director of Post-Classical Ensemble in Washington DC, Mr. Gil-Ordóñez also holds the positions of Music Director of Wesleyan University's Orchestra and Choir, Director of Private Lessons, Chamber Music and Ensembles, and that of Music Director of the Wesleyan Ensemble of the Americas.