Three down, more to come? This year, the Grant Park Music Festival departed from its usual norm of sprinkling guest conductors throughout the season in favor of longer, deeper stays by three conductors: Ludovic Morlot (formerly of the Seattle Symphony, now Barcelona Symphony Orchestra), Giancarlo Guerrero (Nashville Symphony) and, since last week, Eric Jacobsen. With incumbent conductor and artistic director Carlos Kalmar leaving his post next month, the search for his successor is heating up — but not yet cooked, stresses festival president and CEO Paul Winberg. In an interview before Wednesday’s concert, Winberg said the search committee — six orchestra members, one chorister and four board members — won’t meet until after the season wraps so it can assess all three candidates at once.
Their deliberations will be guided by musician feedback (formally gathered in post-cycle surveys) and audience feedback (informal, but still acknowledged). He added that the festival is prepared to extend its search beyond this season, if needed. Should that happen, the orchestra would enter a buffer period not unlike the Chicago Symphony’s as it awaits Klaus Mäkelä’s arrival .
“I’m completely comfortable with that,” Winberg says. “At the end of the day, if we don’t have somebody the orchestra and chorus really embraces, we’ve got to keep looking.” Based on this month’s concerts, Jacobsen would be an intuitive pick for the mantle.
The conductor and cellist ha.