After 40 years, Stephen Gunzenhauser, 77, will retire as conductor of Lancaster Symphony (Pennsylvania) following the 2019-20 season, the Orchestra said. He was appointed in 1979.
Conductor Stephen Gunzenhauser was born in New York. After earning degrees at the Oberlin and New England conservatories, he received three successive Fulbright grants to study at the Salzburg Mozarteum. He served as assistant to three legendary conductors – Igor Markevitch, Istvan Kertesz, and Leopold Stokowski. In 1979, he was appointed music director of the Delaware Symphony Orchestra, a position he held until 2002.
Gunzenhauser has become well known internationally for his recordings, numbering over seventy, including a complete cycle of the Dvorak symphonies with the Slovak Philharmonic Orchestra for Naxos.
After retirement, Gunzenhauser plans to focus on the Endless Mountain Music Festival, of which he has been a part since its inception in 2006. The festival is held in Pennsylvania and New York.
