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  • PAULO BORTOLAMEOLLI, ELIM CHAN AND KAHCHUN WONG SELECTED FOR THE LA PHIL’S 2016/17 DUDAMEL FELLOWSHIP PROGRAM
  • Aug. 15, 2016
  • Los Angeles, CA (August 15, 2016) – The Los Angeles Philharmonic Association has announced the three conductors who will participate in the 2016/17 Dudamel Fellowship ProgramPaulo Bortolameolli, Elim Chan and Kahchun Wong. Music & Artistic Director Gustavo Dudamel, together with the Los Angeles Philharmonic, created the Dudamel Fellowship Program in 2009 to provide a unique opportunity for promising young conductors from around the world to develop their craft and enrich their musical experience through personal mentorship and participation in the LA Phil’s orchestral, education and community programs. 

    “As we enter the eighth year of this program, I am extremely proud to be working with these young, exceptional conductors from all over the world,” commented Dudamel. “The LA Phil’s commitment to training, encouraging and supporting talent provides an extraordinary opportunity for these Fellows to learn and grow.”

    The Fellows will work alongside Dudamel and musicians of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, as well as visiting artists and conductors, and will also work with students in key LA Phil education programs. The program for each of the Fellows will run separately. The Fellows will hone their skills through observation and application, such as conducting Los Angeles Philharmonic youth concerts at Walt Disney Concert Hall, participating as cover conductors, and serving as mentors themselves through participation in programs such as Youth Orchestra Los Angeles (YOLA).

    The 2016/17 Dudamel Fellows are:

    Paulo Bortolameolli (Chile), who will be conducting:

    February 18, 25, 2017
    Los Angeles Philharmonic
    Walt Disney Concert Hall
    Toyota Symphonies for Youth

    The Art of the Piano
    An in-depth exploration of the piano, from the artisan who builds it to the virtuoso who plays it, featuring music by Brahms, Beethoven and Tchaikovsky.

    Praised by composer George Crumb for his “sensitive and insightful

    Interpretation,” conductor Paolo Bortolameolli brings a collaborative approach to music and a passion for connecting the 21st-century audience to the concert stage. Bortolameolli enjoys conducting orchestral music, working with youth orchestras, collaborating with today’s composers, lecturing and writing.

    Bortolameolli was a semifinalist in the Mahler Competition 2016. As Assistant Conductor of Yale Philharmonia, he has collaborated with conductors such as Peter Oundjian, Xu Zhong, Jahja Ling, Shinik Hahm, William Christie and Helmuth Rilling.

    During the 2014/2015 season he was the cover conductor of the internationally renowned Baltimore Symphony Orchestra under Marin Alsop. He was also Principal Conductor of the New Haven Chamber Orchestra during the 2012/2013 season.

    In 2013 he made his debut with Orquesta Filarmónica de Santiago (Chile), celebrating the Centennial Anniversary of the premiere of The Rite of Spring, in a performance that garnered him the Special Award from the Chilean Critics Association.

    He has debuted in front of every major orchestra of his country including: Orquesta Sinfónica de Chile, Orquesta de la Universidad de Concepción, Orquesta USACH, Orquesta de Cámara de Chile, and Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional Juvenil.

    In 2016 Paulo Bortolameolli will make his debut as an opera conductor with Tancredi (Rossini) at Teatro Municipal de Santiago Opera. In 2007 he was named among the 100 Young Leaders of the Country by the Chilean national Magazine Sábado. Bortolameolli has been the Principal Conductor of the Orquesta Sinfónica Juvenil de Colina (2009 – 2011) as well as Assistant Conductor of the USACH Orchestra and the Faculty of Arts Orchestra (OFA).

    Elim Chan (Hong Kong), who will be conducting:

    November 26 and December 3, 2016
    Los Angeles Philharmonic
    Walt Disney Concert Hall
    Toyota Symphonies for Youth

    Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker

    Born in Hong Kong, Elim Chan became the first female winner of the Donatella Flick LSO Conducting Competition in December 2014, as a result of which she held the position of Assistant Conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra for 2015/16. From the 2017/18 season she assumes the title of Chief Conductor of NorrlandsOperan for three seasons.

    Diary highlights include her debut with the Mariinsky Orchestra in spring 2016 as a result of a personal invitation from Valery Gergiev (both in St. Petersburg and on tour in Mexico with Behzod Abduraimov as soloist), her debut at the Lucerne Festival with the Lucerne Festival Academy Orchestra in August 2016 in a program of Bartók, Adams and Saariaho, and, in spring 2017, her North American debut with the Detroit Symphony and a return visit to the Hong Kong Philharmonic. Other upcoming engagements include debuts with the Lucerne Symphony, Orchestre Philharmonique de Luxembourg, Orchestre National de Belgique, Australian Youth Orchestra, Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne, Norrkoping Symphony and Orquesta Filarmonica de Gran Canaria and re-invitations to Orchestre National de Lille and Orchestra Haydn di Bolzano e Trento. She returned to Mexico in May 2016 to debut with Orquesta Filarmonica de Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Mexico.

    Previous engagements include her debut with the National Arts Centre Orchestra, Ottawa and the Orchestre de la Francophonie as part of the NAC Summer Music Institute in 2012, where she worked with Pinchas Zukerman, her participation in the Musical Olympus Festival, St. Petersburg, and workshops with the Cabrillo Festival and Baltimore Symphony orchestras (with Marin Alsop, Gerard Schwarz and Gustav Meier). She also took part in master classes with Bernard Haitink in Lucerne in spring 2015.

    Elim Chan holds degrees from Smith College and the University of Michigan. While there, she served as Music Director of the University of Michigan Campus Symphony Orchestra and the Michigan Pops Orchestra. She also received the Bruno Walter Conducting Scholarship in 2013.

    Kahchun Wong (Singapore), who will be conducting:

    December 16, 2016
    Los Angeles Philharmonic
    Wilshire United Methodist Community Concert

    An innovative and passionate force both on and off the conductor’s podium, Singaporean-born conductor Kahchun Wong is one of Asia’s most dynamic young conductors. In May 2016, he was awarded 1st Prize at the 5th Gustav Mahler Conducting Competition, making a strong impression with his natural musical instinct and maturity for both canonic and modern repertoire. 

    Engagements for 2016/2017 include the Aarhus Symphony Orchestra, China Philharmonic Orchestra, Croatian National Theatre Ivan Zajc, Guangzhou Symphony Orchestra, Hong Kong Sinfonietta, New Japan Philharmonic Orchestra, Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, Singapore Chinese Orchestra, Singapore Lyric Opera, St.Petersburg Symphony Orchestra at the Musical Olympus Festival, Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra and the Vietnam National Symphony Orchestra.

    A personal initiative that Wong is spearheading with the Asian Contemporary Ensemble in June 2016 is “musi/care: festival without borders”  a two-week-long project involving not only professional musicians, but also elementary school students and 10 different voluntary and welfare organizations in Singapore, ranging from hospitals to eldercare centers and juvenile shelters.

    A protégé of Kurt Masur, Wong was handpicked to attend five of his highly sought-after international conducting seminars, which culminated in a week of assistantship at the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra in September 2013. He also enjoys a close association with Bernard Haitink, who has invited him twice to his master class in conducting at the Lucerne Easter Festival; Esa-Pekka Salonen, who gave him the opportunity to work with the Philharmonia Orchestra as an assistant conductor finalist; and Robert Spano, who selected him as a conducting fellow of the Aspen Music Festival’s American Academy for Conducting over two consecutive summers.

    Born in 1986, Wong began musical studies on the cornet at the age of 7. As the first-ever recipient of the distinguished Lee Kuan Yew Scholarship (Public Service Commission) in the field of Arts and Culture, he continued his studies in opera and orchestral conducting with Christian Ehwald and Hans-Dieter Baum at the Hanns-Eisler Musikhochschule in Berlin, Germany.

    Subscriptions for the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s 2016/17 season at Walt Disney Concert Hall are currently available. To purchase, please visit LAPhil.com or the Walt Disney Concert Hall Box Office. For more information, please call 323.850.2000.

    The Los Angeles Philharmonic Association, under the vibrant leadership of Music & Artistic Director Gustavo Dudamel, presents an inspiring array of music from all genres – orchestral, chamber and Baroque music, organ and celebrity recitals, new music, jazz, world music and pop – at two of L.A.’s iconic venues, Walt Disney Concert Hall (www.laphil.com) and the Hollywood Bowl (www.hollywoodbowl.com). The LA Phil’s season at Walt Disney Concert Hall extends from September through May, and throughout the summer at the Hollywood Bowl. With the preeminent Los Angeles Philharmonic at the foundation of its offerings, the LA Phil aims to enrich and transform lives through music, with a robust mix of artistic, education and community programs.

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  • Contact:

    Sophie Jefferies, sjefferies@laphil.org, 213.972.3422
    Photos: 213.972.3034