“On Dec. 21 Mr. Thomas turns 70, though you wouldn’t guess it from seeing him, either close up or in action on the podium of the San Francisco Symphony, the ensemble he has taken to the top rank of American orchestras as the music director since 1995. . . Though many orchestras now run their own live recording labels, Mr. Thomas and the San Francisco Symphony were at the start of this trend with SFS Media. The results have been ‘tremendous,’ he said, with 11 Grammys, including several for installments in the orchestra’s acclaimed accounts of the complete Mahler symphonies. With “Keeping Score,” Mr. Thomas’s popular series of PBS programs and multimedia projects, focused on explicating major works by Beethoven, Stravinsky and more, Mr. Thomas has proved the most compelling music teacher for the public since Bernstein.” Read more here.
