The Grant Park Orchestra was formed in 1944 when the Chicago Park District assembled a single resident orchestra under the direction of Principal Conductor Nikolai Malko to perform at the Grant Park Music Festival (which began in 1935 and featured a series of visiting orchestras). Since then, other prestigious conductors have held the position, including Irwin Hoffman, Leonard Slatkin, David Zinman, Zdnek Macal and Hugh Wolff. In 2000, Carlos Kalmar was named the Festival’s Principal Conductor.

Today, the Grant Park Orchestra draws its musicians from different orchestras and musical institutions throughout the United States. Each summer, all of the orchestra members gather in Millennium Park for a ten-week long season consisting of intensive rehearsals and performances. During the year, the musicians can be found across the country performing with major orchestras, teaching at numerous universities and appearing frequently in concert stages across the country. Some organizations represented by Grant Park Orchestra musicians include the Lyric Opera of Chicago, the Metropolitan Opera, the Buffalo, Colorado, Jacksonville, Kansas City, Milwaukee, New Mexico, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, Richmond, San Antonio, Seattle, and Utah Symphonies. The Grant Park Orchestra was nominated for a Grammy award for its recording entitled Robert Kurka: Symphonic Works.

Six-time GRAMMY® Award-winning conductor Giancarlo Guerrero named artistic leader of Chicago’s Grant Park Music Festival.

The internationally renowned conductor and longtime music director of the Nashville Symphony Orchestra and music director designate of the Sarasota Orchestra becomes the Festival’s eighth artistic director and principal conductor. Guerrero led the Grant Park Orchestra and Chorus in three acclaimed concerts during the 2024 season and has taken the reins of the Festival’s artistic team for the 2025 season. He will conduct four weeks next summer. The Festival has presented free classical concerts since 1935 and attracts hundreds of thousands each year. 

“We are thrilled to welcome Giancarlo Guerrero to Chicago to lead what is regarded as the United States’ most important free classical music institution,” said Paul Winberg, Grant Park Orchestral Association President and CEO. “Giancarlo is not only a brilliant conductor with a stellar reputation; he has a history of curating programs that are exciting, surprising, and inventive. Also, our musicians are tremendously excited about working with him. His concerts last summer sparked a palpable energy from our audiences. It is a joy to listen to the music he conducts. The Grant Park Music Festival is highly anticipated by Chicagoans each year; we are confident that our future is in excellent hands with Giancarlo at the podium.” 

Praised for his “viscerally powerful performances” (Boston Globe) and described as “at once vigorous, passionate, and nuanced” (BachTrack), Guerrero is one of the most respected orchestra conductors in the world. He succeeds Carlos Kalmar, who served in the position for 25 seasons, and will now hold the title of conductor laureate. Guerrero is familiar to Chicago audiences through his frequent appearances with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. In addition, he has led multiple programs with the Grant Park Music Festival since his 2008 debut.

“From the moment I first walked onto the stage of the glorious Pritzker Pavilion, and looked out at the sea of people – a snapshot of the entire city of Chicago – it was immediately apparent what a gift the Grant Park Music Festival is to the community. In the heart of this vibrant downtown, in one of the most exciting cities in the world, here is a festival dedicated to orchestral music and designed to be enjoyed by everyone. The mission of the Festival aligns closely with my philosophy that music is meant to be enjoyed by people from all walks of life, without boundaries,” said Guerrero. “I felt such a natural, easy connection with these incredible musicians – including both the stellar orchestra and the spectacular chorus. I recognized sparks flying, musically speaking, from my first interactions with them from the podium. These musicians, hailing from orchestras and opera companies from the region and throughout the world, are really the best of the best.”

During the 2024 Festival, Guerrero led two programs: the first featuring Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 5 on July 10, and the second featuring Beethoven’s Emperor Concerto with Maurice Duruflé's Requiem on July 12 and 13. Reviewing the Shostakovich program for the Chicago Tribune, Hannah Edgar praised Guerrero’s “curatorial and interpretive creativity” and added that his pre-performance remarks to the audience “provided context for both pieces… that mirrored his interpretation of the symphony: emphatic, practiced and assertive.” Recognizing that he might be a candidate to replace Kalmar, Edgar concluded that “Guerrero will have no problem leaving his mark.” 

Festival concertmaster Jeremy Black also lauded Guerrero’s leadership of the orchestra, saying, “Giancarlo established a genuine rapport with the orchestra. I remember hearing one of my orchestra colleagues say, ‘he lit a fire under us!’ He's a superb musician who can inspire us to perform at the highest level.” 

“The Grant Park Music Festival drew hundreds of thousands of people during our recently concluded summer season,” added Grant Park Orchestral Association Board Chair Adam Grais. “Not only do our concerts attract dedicated music lovers and introduce thousands of young people to classical music, we also present some of the world’s most esteemed musicians to our stage. Concertgoers tell me that the Festival is one of the things they most love about Chicago. And Giancarlo possesses the talent, relationships, vision and drive to lead our organization to even greater accomplishments in the future.”

The board of directors of the Grant Park Orchestral Association enthusiastically voted unanimously at an August 15 meeting to name Guerrero as the successor to Kalmar, who had announced in 2021 that he was stepping down at the end of the Festival 2024. The search for Kalmar’s replacement was a three-year process undertaken by a search committee composed of musicians, members of the board of directors and community leaders. The Festival team will announce Guerrero’s plans for the 2025 season in January.

About Giancarlo Guerrero

In the 2024-2025 season, Guerrero will serve in his 16th and final year as music director of the Nashville Symphony. Guerrero collaborated with the Nashville Symphony to premiere over two dozen new works and release 22 commercial albums. These definitive recordings garnered 13 GRAMMY® Award nominations and six GRAMMY® wins, cementing Guerrero and the Symphony’s international reputation as standard-bearers for recordings of contemporary American music. As part of his commitment to fostering the work of contemporary composers, Guerrero, together with composer Aaron Jay Kernis, also guided the creation of Nashville Symphony’s biannual Composer Lab & Workshop for young and emerging composers.

Guerrero has collaborated throughout his career with leading ensembles in North America, including the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Boston Symphony, New York Philharmonic, and Philadelphia Orchestra, among others. Internationally, he has maintained longstanding relationships with esteemed orchestras in Europe, Latin America and Australia/New Zealand. Guerrero also recently completed a six-season tenure as music director of the NFM Wrocław Philharmonic in Poland. Guerrero previously held posts as the principal guest conductor of both the Cleveland Orchestra Miami Residency and the Gulbenkian Orchestra in Lisbon, music director of the Eugene Symphony, and associate conductor of the Minnesota Orchestra. 

Born in Nicaragua, Guerrero immigrated during his childhood to Costa Rica, where he joined the local youth symphony. He studied percussion and conducting at Baylor University in Texas and earned his master’s degree in conducting at Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois. Given his beginnings in civic youth orchestras, Guerrero is particularly engaged with conducting training orchestras and has worked with the Curtis School of Music, Colburn School in Los Angeles, National Youth Orchestra (NYO2) and Yale Philharmonia, as well as with the Nashville Symphony’s Accelerando program, which provides an intensive music education to promising young students from diverse ethnic backgrounds.

Jeremy Black became concertmaster of the Grant Park Orchestra in 2005 and has been principal second violin of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra since 2017. Black has been invited to perform as guest concertmaster with the Pittsburgh Symphony, Minnesota Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra, Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, and Buffalo Philharmonic, and in the violin sections of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, and Cleveland Orchestra.

As a soloist and leader, Jeremy Black has performed with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, Grant Park Orchestra, Pittsburgh Live Chamber Ensemble, and in subscription concerts with the Chicago String Ensemble and Evanston Symphony. Highlights include a performance of the Dvořák Violin Concerto with Manfred Honeck and the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, and the Bach Concerto for Two Violins with Pinchas Zuckerman and the Grant Park Orchestra. Other solo performances with the Pittsburgh Symphony include concertos by Mendelssohn, Tchaikovsky, Mozart, Bach and Vivaldi, and works by Sarasate, Piazzolla, and John Williams. He has also given recitals at Carnegie Mellon, Chatham, and Duquesne Universities, West Liberty State College, and the Pittsburgh Theological Seminary.

Jeremy Black is sought-after as a teacher as well as a performer. He maintains an active private studio, is the coach of Chamber Music Pittsburgh’s competitive Montgomery Fellowship Quartet program, and is the first violin coach for the Pittsburgh Youth Symphony Orchestra (PYSO) and Three Rivers Young People’s Orchestra (YPO). He has given master classes at many schools and universities, including Roosevelt University, Penn State University, Sphinx Performance Academy at Northwestern University, and Midwest Young Artists. His students have been accepted to top American music schools and have performed as concertmasters of both PYSO and YPO.

Jeremy Black was applauded for his “musical fire” and “effortless technique” by the Chicago Tribune for his debut performance with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra at age 12, winning first prize in the nationally broadcast 1991 Illinois Bell/WTTW Young Performers Competition. He won first prizes in the University of Michigan and Case Western Reserve University concerto competitions, the Society of American Musicians Competition, the Nordic Musical Arts Competition, and the Fischoff International Chamber Music Competition.

A native of Evanston, Illinois, Jeremy Black studied with the late Mark Zinger, a former student and colleague of David Oistrakh. His secondary education began in 1996 at Case Western Reserve University where he studied with Linda Cerone at the Cleveland Institute of Music. He then pursued his master’s degree with Paul Kantor at the University of Michigan.

Jeremy Black resides in Pittsburgh's Highland Park neighborhood with his wife, Kate, and their two sons. He plays a violin made by Lorenzo and Tommaso Carcassi, dated 1783. 

(3 February 1809 – 4 November 1847) Felix Mendelssohn was a German composer, conductor, pianist and of the early Romantic period. Mendelssohn's compositions include symphonies, concertos, piano music and chamber music. His best-known works include his overture and incidental music for A Midsummer Night's Dream, the Italian Symphony, the Scottish Symphony, the oratorio Elijah, the overture The Hebrides, his mature Violin Concerto, and his String Octet. The melody for the Christmas carol "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing" is also his. Mendelssohn's Songs Without Words are his most famous solo piano compositions.

A grandson of the philosopher Moses Mendelssohn, Felix Mendelssohn was born into a prominent Jewish family. He was brought up without religion until the age of seven when he was baptized as a Reformed Christian. Felix was recognized early as a musical prodigy, rivaling Mozart, but his parents were cautious and did not seek to capitalize on his talent.

As a performer and writer, Mendelssohn enjoyed early success in Germany and almost singlehandedly revived interest in the music of Johann Sebastian Bach, notably with Mendelssohn's performance of the St. Matthew Passion in 1829. He was well received in his travels throughout Europe as a composer, conductor and soloist; his ten visits to Britain where he was welcomed into the court of Queen Victoria and Prince Albert. While in Britain, many of his major works were premiered. His essentially conservative musical tastes set him apart from more adventurous musical contemporaries such as Franz Liszt, Richard Wagner, Charles-Valentin Alkan and Hector Berlioz. The Leipzig Conservatory, which he founded, became a bastion of this anti-radical outlook. After a long period of relative denigration due to changing musical tastes and antisemitism in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, his creative originality has been re-evaluated. He is now among the most popular composers of the Romantic era.

(August 25, 1918 – October 14, 1990) Leonard Bernstein was an American composer, conductor, music educator, pianist and writer. A Renaissance man, he was one of the most celebrated Americans of the 20th century.

He dabbled in many genres, including opera, musical theater, jazz, symphonic music, ballet, chamber music, film and theatre music. His Broadway musical West Side Story is perhaps his most famous work, and became the Academy Award-winning feature film.

As music director of the New York Philharmonic, Bernstein was the first American-born conductor to head an American orchestra and achieve international acclaim. He was instrumental in reviving the music of Gustav Mahler.

Bernstein was also the first conductor to use television as a means of sharing music with a wider audience, taping dozens of national and international broadcasts, including his Emmy Award-winning Young People's Concerts.

A champion of human rights, Bernstein supported the Civil Rights Movement, fought for nuclear disarmament, protested the Vietnam War and helped raise money for HIV/AIDS research.

Bernstein won eleven Emmy Awards, a Tony Award, seventeen Grammy Awards, and the Kennedy Center Honor.

Adolphus Hailstork received his doctorate in composition from Michigan State University, where he was a student of H. Owen Reed.  He had previously studied at the Manhattan School of Music, under Vittorio Giannini and David Diamond, at the American Institute at Fontainebleau with Nadia Boulanger, and at Howard University with Mark Fax. 

Dr. Hailstork has written numerous works for chorus, solo voice, piano, organ, various chamber ensembles, band, orchestra, and opera. 

Among his early compositions are: CELEBRATION, recorded by the Detroit Symphony in 1976;  OUT OF THE DEPTHS (1977), and AMERICAN GUERNICA (1983), are two band works which won national competitions. CONSORT PIECE (1995) commissioned by the Norfolk (Va.) Chamber Ensemble, was awarded first prize by the University of Delaware Festival of Contemporary Music. 

Significant performances by major orchestras (Philadelphia, Chicago, and New York) have been led by leading conductors such as James de Priest, Paul Freeman, Daniel Barenboim, Kurt Masur, Lorin Maezel, Jo Ann Falletta and David Lockington. This March, Thomas Wilkins conducted Hailstork’s AN AMERICAN PORT OF CALL with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. 

The composer’s second symphony (commissioned by the Detroit Symphony, and second opera, JOSHUA’S BOOTS (commissioned by the Opera Theatre of St. Louis and the Kansas City Lyric Opera) were both premiered in 1999.  Hailstork’s second and third symphonies were recorded by the Grand Rapids Symphony Orchestra (David Lockington)  and were released by Naxos.  Another Naxos recording, AN AMERICAN PORT OF CALL (Virginia Symphony Orchestra) was released in spring 2012. 

Recent commissions include RISE FOR FREEDOM, an opera about the Underground Railroad, premiered in the fall of 2007 by the Cincinnati Opera Company, SET ME ON A ROCK (re: Hurricane Katrina), for chorus and orchestra, commissioned by the Houston Choral Society (2008), and the choral ballet, THE GIFT OF THE MAGI, for treble chorus and orchestra, (2009). In the fall of 2011, ZORA, WE’RE CALLING YOU, a work for speaker and orchestra was premiered by the Orlando Symphony. I SPEAK OF PEACE commissioned by the Bismarck Symphony (Beverly Everett, conductor) in honor of (and featuring the words of) President John F. Kennedy was premiered in November of 2013. 

Hailstork’s newest works include THE WORLD CALLED (based on Rita Dove’s poem TESTIMONIAL), a work for soprano, chorus and orchestra commissioned by the Oratorio Society of Virginia (premiered in May 2018) and STILL HOLDING ON (February 2019) an orchestra work commissioned and premiered by the Los Angeles Philharmonic. He is currently working on his Fourth Symphony, and A KNEE ON A NECK (tribute to George Floyd) for chorus and orchestra. 

Dr. Hailstork resides in Virginia Beach, Virginia, and is Professor of Music and Eminent Scholar at Old Dominion University in Norfolk.