Arnold Mikhailovich Katz (1924-2007) was a Soviet Russian conductor and teacher. People's Artist of the USSR (1988). Founder of the Novosibirsk Academic Symphony Orchestra (1956). Until his death he was its Artistic Director and Principal Conductor.
A.M. Katz was born on 18.09.1924 in Baku.
He studied at the Central School of Music at the Moscow State Conservatory (violin), at the Leningrad State Conservatory as a violinist (1947-1949) and as a conductor (1947-1951, class of Professor I.A. Musin). During the Great Patriotic War he served as a lieutenant in the 38th Engineer Brigade of the 1st Belorussian Front.
In 1951-52 he taught at the Leningrad Conservatory.
From 1956 to 2007 he was Principal Conductor and Artistic Director of the Academic Symphony Orchestra of the Novosibirsk State Philharmonic.
From 1957 to 2004 he was a teacher and professor at the Glinka Novosibirsk State Conservatoire. M.I. Glinka.
Graduates of his class have won various competitions, work in Russia and abroad, and are artistic directors of symphony orchestras. Among his pupils are M. Gorenstein, V. Sinaisky, D. Orlov, M. Abramov, V. Prasolov, E. Shestakov, A. Markin, P. Gerstein, S. Oselkov, R. Skuratov, V. Nelson, L. Mullaev and B. Rivkin.
In the 1970-80s he headed the student orchestra of the Novosibirsk State Conservatory named after M.I. Glinka. In the 1970s and 1980s he headed the student orchestra of the M.I. Glinka Novosibirsk State Conservatory. Several times as Principal Conductor he worked with the Russian-American Youth Orchestra.
А. Katz has staged Prokofiev's opera War and Peace, Glazunov's ballets Raymonda and Tchaikovsky's Sleeping Beauty at the Novosibirsk Opera and Ballet Theater, and Verdi's opera Troubadour at the Maly Opera Theater (St. Petersburg).
Maestro Katz has performed with S. Richter, E. Gilels, D. Oistrakh, M. Rostropovich, L. Kogan, B. Davidovich, Y. Sitkovetsky, Y. Flier, G. Kremer, D. Shafran, D. Bashirov, N. Petrov, O. Kagan, N. Gutman, Y. Bashmet, M. Pletnev, M. Vengerov, V. Repin, A. Barakhovsky and other famous musicians.
Over 50 years under his leadership the orchestra has performed more than five thousand concerts. Music of different epochs and styles all this time brought the joy of creativity to the musicians and aesthetic pleasure to the listeners. Back in the early 1960s, following G. Rozhdestvensky, A.M. Katz performed R. Shchedrin's Second Symphony in Novosibirsk with his orchestra and in Riga with the Riga Symphony Orchestra. At the same time he played Pärt's Second Symphony.
As it appeared, the Novosibirsk Orchestra presented to the audience symphonies by B. Tishchenko, S. Slonimsky. Thanks to A.M. Kats, the Novosibirsk audience heard all the symphonies of D. Shostakovich, S. Prokofiev, works by A. Berg, B. Britten, A. Schnittke, S. Gubaidulina, O. Messiaen and many others. In 1994 in Saarbrücken and Frankfurt A.M. Katz performed the world premiere of E. Denisov's Liturgy of Christ.
A.M. Katz made all recordings of the Novosibirsk Academic Symphony Orchestra on Melodiya with works by G. Purcell, G. Handel, W. Mozart, L. Beethoven, N. Rimsky-Korsakov, S. Taneyev, S. Rachmaninoff, I. Stravinsky, D. Shostakovich, L. Bernstein, Y. Butsko, as well as Novosibirsk composers G. Ivanov and A. Murov.
In 1980, a record of S. Taneyev's Fourth Symphony won the First Prize for the best interpretation and recording quality.
Under the baton of A.M. Katz the orchestra has recorded 11 CDs on Sony Classical, Art Nova, Russian Season, Peter Kondrashin Studio and Audite Musikproduktion.
On the basis of the symphony orchestra A. Katz created two more ensembles and was their artistic director: the Concert Wind Orchestra and the Ensemble of Soloists “Novosibirsk Camerata”. They continue to work with the Novosibirsk Philharmonic Orchestra and perform in Russia and abroad.
