SF Symphony Names Its First-Ever Female Music Director, Elim Chan

Elim Chan, 39, has been named music director of the San Francisco Symphony after a two-year search for a replacement for Esa-Pekka Salonen. Her appointment is the first time a woman has led the orchestra in its 115-year history. Chan previously debuted with the orchestra during the 2022–23 season and most recently served as Principal Conductor of the Antwerp Symphony Orchestra. She becomes only the third woman to lead a top-tier American orchestra. The role follows Salonen’s March 2024 departure, which was linked to financial constraints affecting commissioning plans. The announcement comes a month after Michael Tilson-Thomas’s death, following his 25-year tenure that ended in 2020. Chan expressed honor and praised the orchestra’s musicians, energy, and care.

"Following a two-year search for a replacement for respected conductor and music director Esa-Pekka Salonen, the San Francisco Symphony has named 39-year-old Elim Chan to the role. This marks the first time a woman has been named to lead the San Francisco Symphony in its 115-year history, as the orchestra notes in its announcement today. And Chan, who made her San Francisco Symphony debut during the 202223 season and who most recently served as Principal Conductor of the Antwerp Symphony Orchestra, will be only the third woman ever to lead a top-tier American orchestra, according to the SF Chronicle."

"Chan takes on the role vacated by Esa-Pekka Salonen, who announced he was stepping down in March 2024. The reason for his departure appeared, at the time, likely motivated by the orchestra's tightening finances, which were constraining Salonen's ambitions and ability to commission new work. The announcement of Chan's hiring also arrives just one month after the death of Michael Tilson-Thomas, who made a much more lasting mark on the orchestra during his 25-year tenure as music director, which ended in 2020."

"Chan says in a statement that she is "honored to take the podium" of one of the "truly great orchestras of the world." "From my very first encounter with this orchestra, I have been genuinely struck by the generosity of its musicians exemplified in their sound, their music-making, and in their spirit," Chan says. "The Bay Area has long been the place where the future gets invented. This orchestra carries that same restless, forward-looking energy in everything it does.""

"And, she adds to the Chronicle, "Every time I come here, there's such passion and care in how the orchestra plays... The musicians are quick and professional, and they're feisty. They fight because they care about the music." SF Symphony CEO Matthew Spivey calls Chan "a musician of unusual gifts and a leader of equal substance a rare combination,"

Read at sfist.com