Photo by Eric Sellen

The Brooklyn Philharmonic this week named Michael Christie '96 as its new music director. He takes over after a two-year search that resulted when Robert Spano '83 left to become music director of the Atlanta Symphony.

The handing off of the position from one Conservatory graduate to another is a richly satisfying musical circle for Oberlinians—even more so because Spano was Christie's primary conducting teacher at Oberlin.

In September, Christie will also begin his position as the Virginia G. Piper Music Director of the Phoenix Symphony. He will retain his position as music director of the Colorado Music Festival, and he will continue his association with the Queensland (Australia) Orchestra as a guest conductor; he was chief conductor there from 2001 to 2004.

The Brooklyn Philharmonic, founded in 1954, specializes in new and unusual music. Before Spano, it was led by Dennis Russell Davies and composer Lukas Foss. Christie undoubtedly will imbue the ensemble with his own flair. In a review of a Los Angeles Philharmonic concert of contemporary music last May, the Los Angeles Times described guest conductor Christie as a "daredevil fully in control." In conducting Respighi's Pines of Rome, the paper declared, "Christie drove the orchestra like a Lamborghini screeching down narrow, curvy Roman streets at high speeds, and never lost traction."

Christie has already left his creative mark on the Colorado Music Festival (CMF), which he took over in 2000. Last summer, the CMF Chorus was added to the festival, and for this summer's program, Christie included the rarely heard Violin Concerto by Danish composer Carl Nielsen and an appearance by aerial fabric dancer Fred Deb', who soared above the stage during the second movement of Schubert's Unfinished Symphony. He also increased the presence of world music in CMF concerts, with appearances by the Venezuelan-based Un Mundo Ensemble and renowned kora musican Mamadou Diabate and his ensemble. Audiences seem to approve: the Rocky Mountain News reported earlier this summer that ticket sales were up by 25 percent over last year.

Christie apparently has similar plans for the Brooklyn Philharmonic. In a New York Times story announcing his appointment, he said he's spoken with the orchestra's management about doing works with chorus, and that he was contemplating a program involving indigenous Australian music. New and unusual music—the mainstay of the ensemble—will remain high on the list, he added.

A trumpet performance major, Christie studied conducting at Oberlin with Spano and Peter Jaffe '78. He was toying with the idea of entering the Conservatory's master's degree program in conducting when, almost on a whim, he submitted a videotape of himself conducting Respighi's Pines of Rome to the Sibelius Conducting Competition. When he was awarded a special prize for "outstanding potential," his career decision was, in effect, a done deal. Spano immediately stepped in as Christie's professional mentor and advisor.

An apprenticeship at the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (working with Daniel Barenboim) and a position as associate conductor of the Helsinki Philharmonic followed the competition, as did a position as assistant conductor to Franz Welzer-Möst, then with the Zurich Opera. Welzer-Möst, who was one of the judges at the Sibelius Conducting Competition and is now music director of the Cleveland Orchestra, also became one of Christie's primary mentors.

At 31, Christie has wielded his baton before orchestras throughout Europe, North America, Asia, and Australia. He is widely acknowledged to be one of the music world's rising stars. But he has never performed professionally on the trumpet.

That may soon change.

Doc Severinsen, principal conductor of the Phoenix Pops, wants to open the season by playing a duet with him, Christie told the New York Times.

"I've been practicing a whole lot," he said.