Leonard Slatkin

Internationally acclaimed conductor Leonard Slatkin is Music Director of the Nashville Symphony, Conductor Laureate of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra (SLSO), Music Director Laureate of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Directeur Musical Honoraire of the Orchestre National de Lyon, and Principal Guest Conductor of the Orquesta Filarmónica de Gran Canaria (OFGC). He maintains a rigorous schedule of guest conducting and is active as a composer, author, and educator.  

In addition to multiple appearances in Nashville, the 2026-27 season includes engagements with the International Violin Competition of Indianapolis, Manhattan School of Music Symphony Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra, Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, OFGC, Orchestra of the Music Makers (Singapore), New World Symphony, Colorado Symphony, Las Vegas Philharmonic, Florida Orchestra, SLSO, Frost Symphony Orchestra (Miami), National Symphony Orchestra (Ireland), National Polish Radio Symphony Orchestra, and Orquesta de Valencia. 

Slatkin has received six Grammy awards and 35 nominations. His most recent recording, Pictures at an Exhibition: The Paintings of Bob Peak, was released on Warner Classics in 2026. Naxos has reissued Vox audiophile editions of his SLSO recordings featuring the works of Gershwin, Rachmaninov, and Prokofiev. Other Naxos recordings include Slatkin Conducts Slatkin—a compilation of pieces written by generations of his family—as well as works by Saint-Saëns, Ravel, Berlioz, Copland, Borzova, McTee, and Williams.  

A recipient of the National Medal of Arts, Slatkin also holds the rank of Chevalier in the French Legion of Honor. He has been awarded the Lincoln Medal from Ford’s Theatre Society, the Prix Charbonnier from the Federation of Alliances Françaises, Austria’s Decoration of Honor in Silver, and the League of American Orchestras’ Gold Baton. His debut book, Conducting Business (2012), for which he received the ASCAP Deems Taylor Special Recognition Award, was followed by Leading Tones (2017) and Classical Crossroads: The Path Forward for Music in the 21st Century (2021). His latest books are Eight Symphonic Masterworks of the Twentieth Century (spring 2024) and Eight Symphonic Masterworks of the Nineteenth Century (fall 2024). A second volume of twentieth-century score studies will be published by Bloomsbury in February 2027 as part of this ongoing series. For more information, visit leonardslatkin.com.