Music Director - Marc Taddei
US-born New Zealand conductor Marc Taddei is in his fifth year as music director of the Vector Wellington Orchestra in New Zealand’s capital city, where his zest for creating engaging, erudite and innovative programmes and his close audience connection have won for him and his orchestra an unsurpassed public following and continuing critical acclaim. Apart from the VWO, Marc conducts every professional orchestra in New Zealand, works with the national ballet and opera companies and film festivals, is routinely re-invited to guest conduct the major Australian orchestras, and returns every year to the United States. His work in Wellington follows a highly successful tenure as music director of the Christchurch Symphony. Previously he was also Principal Guest Conductor of the Christchurch Symphony.
Marc Taddei has conducted the Queensland, Sydney, Melbourne, Tasmanian, and Adelaide Symphony Orchestras, Orchestra Victoria, the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, the Auckland Philharmonia, the Chamber Orchestra of Hong Kong and the Silesian State Opera in the Czech Republic. In the US, he conducted the Richmond Symphony, the Louisiana Philharmonic, the Oregon, Fort Worth and New Haven Symphony Orchestras, the Eugene Symphony, and the Southwest Florida Symphony. He has also conducted for Opera New Zealand, the Royal New Zealand Ballet and has been a frequent presence at the New Zealand International Festival of the Arts. His performance with the Louisiana Philharmonic was nominated for best Contemporary Classical Performance of the year at the 12th annual Tribute to the Classical Arts in New Orleans.
Marc has worked with such diverse artists as Dame Kiri Te Kanawa, Angela Brown, Julian Lloyd Webber, Horacio Gutiérrez, Simon O’Neill, Joanna MacGregor, Jonathan Lemalu, Antonio Pompa-Baldi, Sir Howard Morrison, Michael Houstoun, Gregg Baker, Dame Malvina Major, Helen Callus, Csaba Erdélyi, Joshua Redman, Pedro Carneiro, James Morrison, Diana Krall, Bobby Shew, Art Garfunkel, Dave Dobbyn and Kenny Rogers among many others.
This year has seen Marc debut with the Canberra Symphony Orchestra (where he received an immediate re-invitation for engagements in 2012) and a triumphal return to the Christchurch Symphony Orchestra. Conducting the Royal New Zealand Ballet continuously since 2005, this year he toured the company’s Stravinsky Triple Bill. Marc also conducted the NZSO in music for the innovative software package “Booktracks”, which featured music of John Psathas accompanying text of Salman Rushdie. Marc also recorded various anthems for Rugby World Cup games, and the opening ceremonies music of composer Victoria Kelly. This year will also see Marc conduct mezzo-soprano Anne Sofie von Otter on 18 November.
Next year Marc has a full slate of activities starting the year with the NBR New Zealand Opera. In addition to a new line of up concerts with his own orchestra, he returns to guest conduct in Tasmania, Brisbane, Canberra and Adelaide, and is scheduled for a nationwide tour with the Royal New Zealand Ballet.
Marc's impressive discography includes over twenty recordings on the Sony, BMG, Koch, Columbia, Trust, ASV, Universal, Rattle, Concordance and Kiwi Pacific labels, and many of his discs are featured in streaming audio on the Naxos music library web site. In November last year he released two new CDs, one for ABC Classics featuring the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, and the other the Vector Wellington Orchestra’s own performance of Boris Pivogat’s Requiem "The Holocaust", with viola soloist Donald Maurice, on the Atoll Label.
Marc’s successes as a recording artist are informed by his work in the industry as a conductor, soloist, orchestral musician and as a producer. His release of British viola concertos with Helen Callus and the New Zealand Symphony Orchestra received rave reviews in Gramophone, Classic FM, and Strad magazines and the CD was listed as recording of the month by Music Web International and Classic FM. The American Record guide said of his Berlioz Harold in Italy/Bartok Viola Concerto CD that “this is one of the best Harolds you'll find anywhere, and the Bartok will appeal to anyone dissatisfied by previous editions of the score.” His Rattle CD, “View From Olympus” was awarded Classical Album of the Year in 2007 at the Vodafone New Zealand Music Awards and spent an unprecedented nine months at #1 in the classical music charts. It was specially featured by Jim Svejda on KUSC-FM in the United States, and on his nationally syndicated programme, The Record Shelf. Marc’s SONY recording with the Christchurch Symphony went double platinum in 2004.
Marc also conducted the soundtrack to Britain's Channel 4 film based on Wagner's Ring Cycle, which won the prestigious Prix de Basle Special Jury Award for the "most outstanding contribution to European culture in television". He has conducted for television producers such as C4 productions in the UK and New Zealand, Fox Television, TVNZ and TV3 in New Zealand. Marc’s appearances on television have included live performances with Dame Kiri Te Kanawa, Young Musician of the Year, Last Night of the Proms, and a children’s television special entitled “Baby Proms” which introduces preschool childern and their caregivers to the joys of the orchestra. A special televised performance of Vaughn Williams Symphony Antartica featuring Sir Edmund Hillary as narrator was broadcast live via satellite to Scott Base in the Antarctic in a world first in 2005.
An advocate of new media in performance, and extra-musical collaboration as a means of enriching the artistic experience, Marc has worked with many of New Zealand’s finest composers and visual artists in ground-breaking orchestral and visual collaborations that have energized audiences. One such collaboration, entitled Southern Journeys, was released by Natural History New Zealand as a DVD in 2002.
Marc is a graduate of the Julliard School in Manhattan, where he received both bachelors and masters degrees before moving to New Zealand.
