Media Production, D'Lynn Waldron ---- DLW@ClassicalMusicManagement.com
Dr. Allen Robert Gross, Music Director & Conductor ~ Santa Monica Symphony
Critics around the world praise Allen Robert Gross
"Gross has the rare ability to excite an orchestra, to get it to reach beyond its capabilities."
Los Angeles Times
"The American conductor Allen Gross is a style-conscious interpreter who is also fascinated by the unique, distinctive qualities of each work. The tremendous enthusiasm which he arouses in the orchestra is used to polish as well as to vitalize the score. For him, the historical becomes the present."
Heidelberg TAGEBLATT
Honored by the National Endowment for the Arts with five successive grants to bring Artistic Excellence to the community.
Celebrating 22 glorious seasons as Music Director & Conductor of the Santa Monica Symphony
This is Allen Robert Gross’s twentieth season as Music Director and Conductor of the Santa Monica Symphony, during which time he has established it as one of the pre-eminent community orchestras in the country. His critically acclaimed concerts bring audiences to their feet cheering.
His audiences are of all ages and from every segment of the community and include children brought by parents and grandparents who were themselves brought as children to Santa Monica Symphony concerts. His performances of Beethoven symphonies can fill the 3000-seat Santa Monica Civic Auditorium.
The audiences enjoy Gross's entertaining introductions to music and then the expressive flowing athleticism of his conducting style, which evokes the essence of the music for both the musicians and the audience.
A Life in Music
Originally from New York City, where he attended the arts and music high school, Gross received his doctorate in music from Stanford University. He began his professional conducting career in Germany, where he received superlative reviews while serving as Music Director of the Heidelberg Castle Festival, Conductor of the Junges Kammerorchester Heidelberg, and held conducting positions in the opera houses of Freiburg and Aachen. With the Junges Kammerorchester Heidelberg he made a number of studio recordings for South German Radio.
Gross came to Los Angeles in 1983 to assume the direction of the Caltech-Occiental Symphony as a member of the music faculty at both those universities. In 1990, Gross was chosen to be the Music Director and Conductor of the Santa Monica Symphony and received immediate critical acclaim.
As conductor of the Santa Monica Chamber Philharmonia Gross has gone on highly acclaimed international tours to France, Spain, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, the Czech Republic, Poland, and Hungary.
As part of his interest in developing the musical talent of children, Gross served for a number of years as Music Director/Conductor of the Pasadena Young Musicians Orchestra and conductor of the Pasadena Summer Youth Chamber Orchestra.
A wide range of musical interests including the new symphonic music
Gross has a wide range of musical interests. In addition to specializing in the traditional Austro–German and Central European repertoire, he is brings new symphonic music by contemporary composers to his audiences. He has premiered new compositions with the Santa Monica Symphony, the Occidental–Caltech Symphony, and in local and foreign guest conducting appearances.including to China and to Cuba where he conducted the Orquesta Sinfónica de Matanzas as part of the International Festival of Contemporary Music. He has conducted broadcast concerts of new American music from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
Tavis Smiley, on his NPR/IPR show in 2010, featured an interview with Gross and a selection from Smiley's appearance with the Santa Monica symphony narrating Copland's 'Lincoln Portrait'.
Bringing symphonic music into the lives of children
Children are among Conductor Gross’s greatest fans. They are invited to open rehearsals and are brought to special concerts where they cheer him like a rock star. At Santa Monica Symphony performances, children can come down to the stage at the end of the concert to meet the conductor and have their programs signed.
