Andrés Orozco-Estrada has followed a career path of pursuing challenges

To ignite their careers, young conductors often need a competition win or some other event that thrusts them into the spotlight. For Andrés Orozco-Estrada, that moment came in 2004 when he was asked to conduct the Vienna’s Tonkünstler Orchestra as a last-minute substitute, and he did not hesitate.  

“At that time, I thought I was ready, kind of, but, most importantly, I thought, I have to take a chance,” he said. “If I don’t take this opportunity and challenge myself and do my best, then I’ll probably never have a chance like this again. So, I took it. Yes, it was risky, but it went quite well.”

Indeed, it did. The Colombian native, now 46, went on to become the ensemble’s assistant conductor, and his career has followed a steady upward trajectory since. He took over as principal conductor of Italy’s RAI National Symphony Orchestra (the official ensemble of Radiotelevisione Italiana, the Italian public broadcasting network) last season, and he is set to become Cologne’s general music director in 2025-26.

Orozco-Estrada will open the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s 2024-25 season, conducting two different programs, featuring pianist Lang Lang and violinist Benjamin Beilman, who performs instead of Hilary Hahn, who is recovering from a double pinched nerve.

Lang Lang will headline a special performance of classical favorites on Sept. 21. Although it is paired with the orchestra’s annual Symphony Ball, tickets are available for just the concert at 6:30 p.m. In addition, he will lead another program Sept. 19-20 that opens with the CSO debut of Michael Tilson Thomas’ Agnegram. Best known as one of this country’s most esteemed conductors, Tilson Thomas also is a first-rate composer who has written more than dozen works. He penned this piece in 1998 as a tribute to Agnes Albert, a longtime San Francisco Symphony Orchestra board member on her 90th birthday. It will be followed by Samuel Barber’s Violin Concerto with Beilman, who last season completed her three-year tenure as the CSO’s Artist-in-Residence.  

For the Sept. 19-20 lineup, the CSO’s artistic staff asked the conductor to come up with a group of works that connect North and South America, and he chose three selections tied to the theme of love, specifically the tragic tale of Romeo and Juliet. The second half opens with the Overture to Leonard Bernstein’s Broadway adaptation, West Side Story, and continues with Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet and Alberto Ginastera’s Four Dances from Estancia, a balletic love story that shares certain similarities with the Shakespearean play.

“It’s a nice program,” Orozco-Estrada said. “It’s different, but it’s also very colorful and full of different emotions, which is always beautiful to explore.”

 “I really like the way, the style, the sound and the mentality of American orchestras.” — Andrés Orozco-Estrada

Orozco-Estrada first became interested in conducting when he was 7 or 8 and would lead an imaginary orchestra in his family’s living room. Later, when he 14 or 15 and was playing violin in a school orchestra and string quartet, a teacher recognized his interest in conducting and asked him to lead a chamber-music rehearsal. That went well enough that the teacher had him continue for the rest of the semester; he also led a children’s orchestra at his school, imitating conductors he saw on video. All that led to him to pursuing conducting more seriously.     

For his advanced musical training, Orozco-Estrada considered options in the United States and Great Britain but ultimately settled on Vienna, because he was taken with the city’s rich musical history and traditions. It is also helped that tuition was less costly there. So, after two years of preparations at a university in Bogotá, he moved to Vienna in 1997 to pursue the Austrian equivalent of an artist diploma at the Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst Wien (University of Music and Performing Arts, Vienna). The famous school has produced notable conductors such as Claudio Abbado, Nikolaus Harnoncourt, Mariss Jansons and Zubin Mehta.

Orozco-Estrada continues to live in Vienna, still enjoying many of the attributes that brought him there originally. “It’s very beautiful, the capital and not too big,” he said. “This combination of things, I like very much.” Since 2022, he has served on the faculty of his alma mater, bringing his connection to the city full circle.

In the United States, he made his debut with the Houston Symphony in October 2012. It was his first time conducting a prominent U.S. orchestra after leading a few smaller ensembles. American orchestras have different traditions and working methods than those in Europe, he said, so he deliberately waited to make his first big U.S. foray until he felt comfortable. He knew the orchestra was looking for a new music director, but he didn’t take the engagement for that reason.

“But the encounter was very positive,” he said. “We got on musically, and the connection with the musicians was very natural and very positive. They are a top-notch orchestra and play very well, but also as human beings very open-minded and very welcoming.” He immediately felt at home, and after being invited back for a few additional rehearsals, the orchestra invited him to be its music director. “I said, Why not? This was an opportunity to see new things and learn new things,” he said. His appointment was announced in 2013, and he began his duties the following year, remaining in the position through 2022 (and is now conductor laureate). He has tried to come back to the United States two or three times a year since. “I really like the way, the style, the sound and the mentality of American orchestras,” he said.

In addition to his orchestral work, Orozco-Estrada is putting more emphasis on opera. In 2023-24, he made his debuts with La Scala in Milan and the Amsterdam Opera, and as part of his upcoming duties in Cologne, he will serve as general director of that city’s opera company. “It is a different experience,” he said. “It is very challenging. You have to be in control of so many different things, as we all know. It has become more and more interesting for me.”

For now, he’s glad that his current and upcoming posts represent a relatively easy commute from Vienna, but he suspects that will change. “I feel like in a couple of years, I might be happier to be more on the road, flying around,” he said. “Right now, I wanted a different lifestyle.”

Over all, the conductor is pleased with how his career has evolved to this point, but he admits that he is eager to progress. “I have inside of me,” he said, “still the urge, the need, the energy to keep going and find a new challenge.”