75th Anniversary Season 2007/08 in the Royal Festival Hall Return to articles menu page > The International Conductors' Academy of the Allianz Cultural Foundation Starting a career as a conductor is not so much a slippery slope as a vertical rock face. There's the old catch 22 situation: you can't get hired because you've not got enough experience in front of a professional orchestra, and you can't get enough experience in front of a professional orchestra because you can't get hired. Short of founding your own ensemble - which some savvy maestros have done in order to bypass this quandary - the only option is to work your way up, which can take decades, and can also mean that the most outstanding young musicians are past their prime before they've worked with a quality ensemble. In partnership with the Allianz Cultural Foundation, Southbank Centre and the Philharmonia Orchestra, the London Philharmonic Orchestra has been working on an academy for young conductors, offering the most outstanding talent the chance to conduct one of the orchestras in concert at the Royal Festival Hall. The chosen conductors spend a year working with the orchestras, participating in the rehearsal process and working with established maestros. Timothy Walker, Chief Executive and Artistic Director of the London Philharmonic Orchestra, explains how the International Conductors' Academy works: 'We invite twenty people from around the world, who are aware of talent in their geographical area, to nominate young conductors whom they feel are at the right stage to work with first class orchestras. From that list, together with our Principal Conductors, we select twenty young musicians to take a closer look at, subsequently identifying six, and eventually settling on three.' 'It's about giving expertly recognised talent the chance to work with a first-class orchestra', says Timothy Walker, 'giving young conductors a helping hand, rather than setting them up to be judged. We have a responsibility to young, talented musicians, and we always have to be thinking of who the major names of the future are going to be. The great conductors will always have a following, and if we recognise brilliance, and have faith in that brilliance, it will pay off.' Performance with Yossif Ivanov, violin, on Friday 13 June 2008 Return to articles menu page > Back to top >