page_title: Philadelphia Orchestra
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Philadelphia Orchestra / History
context_page_description: The Philadelphia Orchestra is an American symphony orchestra, based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. One of the "Big Five" American orchestras, the orchestra is based at the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, where it performs its subscription concerts, numbering over 130 annually, in Verizon Hall.
  From its founding until 2001, the Philadelphia Orchestra gave its concerts at the Academy of Music. The orchestra continues to own the Academy, and returns there one week per year for the Academy of Music's annual gala concert and concerts for school children. The Philadelphia Orchestra's summer home is the Mann Center for the Performing Arts. It also has summer residencies at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center, and since July 2007 at the Bravo! Vail Valley Festival in Vail, Colorado. The orchestra also performs an annual series of concerts at Carnegie Hall. From its earliest days the orchestra has been active in the recording studio, making extensive numbers of recordings, primarily for RCA Victor and Columbia Records.
  The orchestra's current music director is Yannick Nézet-Séguin, since 2012.
context_section_description: The orchestra was founded in 1900 by Fritz Scheel, who also acted as its first conductor.  The orchestra had its beginnings with a small group of musicians led by the pianist F. Cresson Schell (1857–1942).  In 1904, Richard Strauss guest conducted the orchestra in a program of his compositions, and in 1906 the Polish pianist Artur Rubenstein made his American debut with the orchestra.  Additionally in 1906, the orchestra traveled to the White House to perform in an exclusive concert.
  In February 1907, Leandro Campanari took over and served as interim conductor for a short time during Scheel's illness and after his death. A flutist in the orchestra, August Rodemann, had stood in before Campanari's arrival. He started sabotaging the performances and Campanari was obliged to remove himself from a bad situation.
  In 1907, Karl Pohlig became music director and served until 1912. New music he programmed was unpopular with audiences, and revelations that he had an extra-marital affair with his secretary caused outrage. The orchestra cancelled his contract and gave him a year's salary ($12,000) in severance to avoid a suit from Pohlig alleging a conspiracy to oust him.
  Leopold Stokowski became music director in 1912 and brought the orchestra to national prominence. Under his guidance, the orchestra gained a reputation for virtuosity, and developed what is known as the "Philadelphia Sound."  Stokowski left the orchestra in 1941, and did not return as a guest conductor for nearly 20 years.
  In 1936 Eugene Ormandy joined the organization, and jointly held the post of principal conductor with Stokowski until 1938 when he became its sole music director. He remained as music director until 1980, after which he became Conductor Laureate.  Ormandy conducted many of the orchestra's best-known recordings and took the orchestra on its historic 1973 tour of the People's Republic of China, where it was the first Western orchestra to visit that country in many decades.  The tour was highly successful and it has since returned for three additional successful tours.
  Riccardo Muti became principal guest conductor of the orchestra in the 1970s, and assumed the role as Music Director from Ormandy in 1980, serving through 1992.  His recordings with the orchestra included the symphonies of Ludwig van Beethoven, Johannes Brahms, and Alexander Scriabin, for the EMI and Philips labels.
  Wolfgang Sawallisch succeeded Muti as Music Director from 1993 to 2003.  He made a number of recordings with the orchestra of music of Robert Schumann, Richard Strauss and Richard Wagner, among other composers, for the EMI label.  However, the orchestra lost its recording contract with EMI during this time, which led to a musicians' strike for 64 days in 1996.  Near the end of Sawallisch's tenure, the orchestra released a self-produced set of recordings of the Schumann symphonies with Sawallisch conducting.  In 2003, Sawallisch was named Conductor Laureate, and held the title until his death in 2013.
  In 2003, Christoph Eschenbach succeeded Sawallisch as music director.  This appointment was controversial because Eschenbach had not conducted the orchestra in over four years and there was a perceived lack of personal chemistry between him and the musicians prior to the appointment.  At least one early report tried to downplay this concern.  The orchestra returned to commercial recordings with Eschenbach, on the Ondine label.  However, in October 2006, Eschenbach and the orchestra announced the conclusion of his tenure as music director in 2008, for a total of five years, the shortest tenure as music director in the history of the Philadelphia Orchestra, along with Pohlig.
  After Eschenbach's departure, the Philadelphia Orchestra was without a music director for four years. In February 2007, Charles Dutoit was appointed chief conductor and artistic adviser for four seasons, starting in the fall of 2008 and running through the 2011–2012 season.  This move was made to provide an "artistic bridge" while the orchestra searched for its eighth music director.  According to news arti
caption: The Philadelphia Orchestra on stage with Stokowski for the American premiere of Mahler's Eighth Symphony, March 2, 1916.
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