López-Cobos, Jesús

López-Cobos, Jesús, distinguished Spanish conductor; b. Toro, Feb. 25, 1940. He took a doctorate in philosophy at the Univ. of Madrid (1964), and studied composition at the Madrid Cons, (diploma, 1966) and conducting with Ferrara in Venice, Swarowsky at the Vienna Academy of Music (diploma, 1969), Maag at the Accademia Musicale Chigiana in Siena, and Morel at the Juilliard School of Music in N.Y. In 1969 he won first prize at the Besançon Competition. That same year, he conducted at the Prague Spring Festival and at the Teatro La Fenice in Venice. He subsequently was a regular conductor at the Deutsche Oper in West Berlin (1970–75). In 1972 he made his U.S. debut with the San Francisco Opera conducting Lucia di Lammermoor, and thereafter appeared as a guest conductor throughout the U.S. In 1975 he made his first appearance at London’s Covent Garden conducting Adriana Lecouvreur. On Feb. 4, 1978, he made his Metropolitan Opera debut in N.Y. conducting the same score. He was Generalmusikdirektor of the Deutsche Oper in West Berlin (1980–90), principal guest conductor of the London Phil. (1982–86), chief conductor of the Orquesta Nacional de Espana in Madrid (1984–89), and music director of the Cincinnati Sym. Orch. (1986–2001) and of the Lausanne Chamber Orch. (1990–2000). To mark the 100^th anniversary of the Cincinnati Sym. Orch. in 1995, he conducted it on a tour to Europe. In 1998 he became conductor of the Orchestre Français des Jeunes in Paris.

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire