Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra

Sir Mark Elder has been Music Director of the Hallé since September 2000. He was Music Director of English National Opera (1979–1993), Principal Guest Conductor of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra (1992–1995) and Music Director of Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra, USA (1989–1994). He has held positions as Principal Guest Conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the London Mozart Players.

He has worked with many of the world’s leading symphony orchestras including the Berlin Philharmonic, Orchestre de Paris, Chicago Symphony, Boston Symphony, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Royal Concertgebouw, and London Symphony and London Philharmonic Orchestras. He is a Principal Artist of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment. He has appeared annually at the Proms for many years, including in 1987 and 2006, the internationally televised Last Night of the Proms and from 2003 with the Hallé Orchestra.

He works regularly in the most prominent international opera houses, including the Royal Opera House Covent Garden (where he made his debut in 1976), Metropolitan Opera New York, Opéra National de Paris, Lyric Opera Chicago, Glyndebourne Festival Opera. Other guest engagements have taken him to the Bayreuth Festival (where he was the first English conductor to conduct a new production), Munich, Amsterdam, Zürich, Geneva, Berlin, and the Bregenz Festival.

Sir Mark Elder has made many recordings with orchestras including the Hallé, London Philharmonic, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, BBC Symphony, the OAE, Orchestra of the Royal Opera House and ENO, in repertoire ranging from Verdi, Strauss and Wagner to contemporary music. In 2003 the Hallé launched its own CD label and releases have met with universal critical acclaim culminating in Gramophone Awards for Elgar’s The Dream of Gerontius, The Kingdom and The Apostles. The recent release of Siegfried completes his Hallé RING Cycle, and other Wagner CDs include Parsifal with the Hallé and Lohengrin with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra.

TV appearances include a two-part film on the life and music of Verdi for BBC TV in 1994 and a similar project on Donizetti for German television in 1996. In November 2011 he co-presented BBCTV’s four part series Symphony, and in 2012 fronted BBC2’s TV series Maestro at the Opera. Sir Mark will present a series of TV programmes on BBC4 during the 2015 Proms in which he will talk about eight symphonies ranging from Beethoven to MacMillan featuring performances from the season’s concerts.

From 2011 to 2019 he was Artistic Director of Opera Rara, with whom he has made many award-winning recordings including Donizetti’s Dom Sebastien, Imelda di Lambertazzi, Linda di Chamounix, Maria di Rohan, Les Martyrs and, most recently, Semiramide.

Recent and forthcoming concert engagements, as well as his commitment to the Hallé, include Boston Symphony, Chicago Symphony, National Symphony Orchestra Washington, London Symphony Orchestra, London Philharmonic Orchestra, Russian National Orchestra, Netherlands Radio Philharmonic, Rotterdam Philharmonic, Bergen Philharmonic, Budapest Festival Orchestra, Gothenburg Symphony, Tonhalle-Orchester Zurich, Gürzenich Orchester, Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, Vienna Symphony, the OAE, Australian Youth Orchestra, Royal Academy of Music and performances with National Youth Orchestra and the Hallé at the 2015 BBC Proms. Operatic engagements include a complete performance of Parsifal at the BBC Proms with the Hallé, Tannhäuser and La bohème at the Opéra National de Paris, Benvenuto Cellini for Netherlands Opera, Meistersinger for San Francisco Opera, Billy Budd, Falstaff and La Traviata for Glyndebourne, several productions for Covent Garden including Wozzeck, Fidelio, La bohème ,Il Barbiere di Siviglia and L’Etoile and concert performances of Lohengrin with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra.

Sir Mark Elder was knighted in 2008, was awarded the CBE in 1989 and created a Companion of Honour in the Queen’s Birthday Honours in 2017. He won an Olivier Award in 1991 for his outstanding work at ENO and in May 2006 he was named Conductor of the Year by the Royal Philharmonic Society. He was awarded Honorary Membership of the Royal Philharmonic Society in 2011.

Cynthia Koledo DeAlmeida was appointed by Lorin Maazel as principal oboe of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra in 1991. For two years prior, she was associate principal oboe of the Philadelphia Orchestra under Riccardo Muti.

DeAlmeida received the Bachelor of Music degree from the University of Michigan, studying with Arno Mariotti, and the Master of Music degree from Temple University, as a student of Richard Woodhams. She is also grateful to her other teachers — Sarah Young, Robert Sorton, Elaine Douvas, John Mack, H. Robert Reynolds and Max Rudolf. DeAlmeida proudly plays on F. Loree oboes of Paris, France.

In November 2002, DeAlmeida’s first solo CD was released on the Boston Records label. Classic Discoveries for Oboe was hailed by American Record Guide as “a masterly recording… Cynthia Koledo DeAlmeida is simply one of the finest exponents of the instrument anywhere.” Her second solo CD, entitled Mist Over the Lakeon the Crystal Record label, was released in 2006 to rave reviews: “Ms. DeAlmeida is hands down one of the best players in the world…” In 2015, her third CD Silver and Gold was released on the Crystal Records label. Gramophone magazine called her “a poetic artist” and Fanfare magazine wrote “she is a soloist of immense technique and considerable charm…”  DeAlmeida can also be heard on Crystal Records’ recording of Sir Andre Previn’s Sonata for Oboe, Bassoon, and Piano with Sir Andre Previn, as well as all the Pittsburgh Symphony recordings since 1991 under Lorin Maazel, Mariss Jansons, Marek Janowski and Manfred Honeck. In 2009, DeAlmeida travelled to Berlin to perform and record the German Requiem of Brahms with Marek Janowski and the Radio Orchestra of Berlin (RSB) on the Pentatone label.

DeAlmeida has been featured with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra in concertos by J.S.Bach, Leonardo Balada, Alan Fletcher, Francaix, Haydn, Mozart, Lucas Richman, Richard Strauss and Vaughan Williams. She performed these concertos with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra conducted by Andres Cardenes, Sir Andrew Davis, Gunther Herbig, Manfred Honeck, Lorin Maazel, Sir Andre Previn, Lucas Richman, Alessandro Siciliani, Leonard Slatkin, Jeanette Sorrell, Yoav Talmi and Pinchas Zukerman. The concertos by Balada, Richman and Fletcher were all commissioned for DeAlmeida by the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, in 1992, 2006 and 2015 respectively. The Balada was recorded for New World Records with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, Lorin Maazel conducting. The Richman concerto was recorded for Albany Records with the Pittsburgh Symphony, Lucas Richman conducting. Four different times, DeAlmeida has performed Bach’s Concerto for Violin and Oboe with the Pittsburgh Symphony, partnering with violinists Vladimir Spivakov, Andres Cardenes, Pinchas Zukerman and Noah Bendix-Balgley. DeAlmeida also has appeared as soloist with the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Haddonfield Symphony, the Cayuga Chamber Orchestra, the Concerto Soloists of Philadelphia, the Knoxville Symphony, the U.S. Army Orchestra and the Carnegie Mellon Philharmonic. 

DeAlmeida is an avid chamber musician, having performed 10 recitals at Carnegie Mellon University since 1993. For one of these recitals, she commissioned, published and recorded a piece for Oboe, Horn, Cello, and Piano by Michael Moricz, entitled “Three Consequences for Four Players.” Each summer since 2002, she performs and teaches as a faculty member of the Music Academy of the West in Santa Barbara, California. Several of her performances there have been featured on NPR’s Performance Today. DeAlmeida has also performed at the Strings Festival in Steamboat Springs, Colorado; the La Jolla Festival in La Jolla, California; and the Marlboro Music Festival in Vermont as well as several “Music from Marlboro” tours.

Teaching has always been a rewarding part of DeAlmeida’s artistic life. She has been associate teaching professor at Carnegie Mellon University’s School of Music since 2012, and a faculty member there since 1991. She has held teaching positions at Temple University in Philadelphia and Trenton State College in New Jersey, and has taught at the National Orchestral Institute at the University of Maryland as well as the New World Symphony. She has given masterclasses at universities in the United States and abroad including the Manhattan School of Music, the University of Tennessee, Eastern Michigan University, the University of South Carolina and the Seoul Conservatory. 

In 2003, DeAlmeida was featured on national television on the CBS Early Show in a story relating to the oboe and its remarkable health benefits for asthma sufferers, which led to her work as an ambassador for the American Respiratory Alliance in Pittsburgh.

DeAlmeida volunteers at Pittsburgh’s classical radio station WQED in their fundraising pledge drives. She participates in the Pittsburgh Symphony’s Education and Community Engagement department playing and speaking to young people in various venues throughout the Pittsburgh area. Each summer, DeAlmeida enjoys volunteering at the Woodlands Foundation’s Notes from the Heart music camp in Wexford, Pennsylvania.