{"id":2426754,"date":"2026-05-21T17:42:07","date_gmt":"2026-05-21T17:42:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2426754"},"modified":"2026-05-21T17:42:07","modified_gmt":"2026-05-21T17:42:07","slug":"san-francisco-symphony-appoints-elim-chan-as-music-director","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/san-francisco-symphony-appoints-elim-chan-as-music-director\/","title":{"rendered":"San Francisco Symphony Appoints Elim Chan as Music Director"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><\/p>\n<div>\n<div class=\"routes-Site-routes-Post-SinglePost-__SinglePost__mpost_Info\">\n<div class=\"routes-Site-routes-Post-SinglePost-__SinglePost__mpost_dateAndTime\">\n<p><time class=\"components-DateFormatted-__DateFormatted__dateTime\" datetime=\"2026-05-21T16:29:42.000Z\">May 21, 2026<\/time><\/p>\n<p><time class=\"components-DateFormatted-__DateFormatted__dateTime\" datetime=\"2026-05-21T16:29:42.000Z\"><span>Updated <!-- -->9:38 am PT<\/span><\/time><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"routes-Site-routes-Post-SinglePost-__SinglePost__mpost_Excerpt\">\n<p>In a historic move, Chan will become the first woman to lead one of the country\u2019s \u2018Big 7\u2019 orchestras.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"routes-Site-routes-Post-StandardImage-__StandardImage__postImage_featImg\">\n<div class=\"routes-Site-routes-Post-StandardImage-__StandardImage__postImage_featImg_ImgWrap\"><\/div>\n<p><span class=\"\" title=\"\">Elim Chan has been appointed the new Music Director of the San Francisco Symphony. The 39-year-old Hong Kong native has signed a six-year contract and will start in the role in 2027.<\/span><cite class=\"routes-Site-routes-Post-StandardImage-__StandardImage__postImage_FeaturedImgCaption_Credit\">\u00a0(Cody Pickens)<\/cite><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div>\n<p class=\"blocks-v1-Paragraph-__Paragraph__paragraph wp-block wp-block-paragraph container\" title=\"\">The <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.kqed.org\/arts\/tag\/san-francisco-symphony\">San Francisco Symphony<\/a> has appointed Elim Chan as its new Music Director. The 39-year-old conductor born in Hong Kong has signed a six-year contract, the Symphony announced Thursday.<\/p>\n<p class=\"blocks-v1-Paragraph-__Paragraph__paragraph wp-block wp-block-paragraph container\" title=\"\">The appointment is a historic one. Chan will be the first woman to lead one of the so-called \u201cBig 7\u201d symphony orchestras in the United States, encompassing New York, Boston, Cleveland, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco and Philadelphia.<\/p>\n<p class=\"blocks-v1-Paragraph-__Paragraph__paragraph wp-block wp-block-paragraph container\" title=\"\">Chan, most recently the principal conductor for the Antwerp Symphony Orchestra in Belgium, is lesser-known than her two predecessors in San Francisco: <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.kqed.org\/arts\/tag\/michael-tilson-thomas\">Michael Tilson Thomas<\/a>, who led the orchestra for 25 years, and died earlier this month, and <a rel=\"nofollow\" target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.kqed.org\/arts\/13954083\/esa-pekka-salonen-steps-down-sf-symphony\">Esa-Pekka Salonen<\/a>, who stepped down in 2024.<\/p>\n<p><span class=\"utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutube\"><br \/>\n          <span class=\"utils-parseShortcode-shortcodes-__youtubeShortcode__embedYoutubeInside\"><\/p>\n<div class=\"jeg_video_container jeg_video_content\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"Elim Chan conducts Ludwig van Beethoven - Symphony n\u00b0 1 in C major, Op  21\" width=\"500\" height=\"281\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/fvMRqU1EU_U?feature=oembed\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" referrerpolicy=\"strict-origin-when-cross-origin\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<p>          <\/span><br \/>\n        <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"blocks-v1-Paragraph-__Paragraph__paragraph wp-block wp-block-paragraph container\" title=\"\">As a conductor, Chan may best be described as outsized. Praised for her energy and rhythm, and noted for bringing precision and verve to nominally calm, languorous musical passages, Chan transcends her diminutive height. Often, she arcs forward, as if charging after the music. (Along with conducting, Chan has also trained on the side with a boxing coach.)<\/p>\n<p class=\"blocks-v1-Paragraph-__Paragraph__paragraph wp-block wp-block-paragraph container\" title=\"\">Speaking with the <em>New York Times<\/em> in 2024, the violinist Leila Josefowicz described Chan\u2019s hands-on style with the orchestra: \u201cShe\u2019s totally herself, which is really wonderful \u2026 She\u2019s a very daring musician, and she\u2019s going to try all kinds of things, all kinds of works, all kinds of different ways to make music.<\/p>\n<p><h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Breaking a glass ceiling\u00a0\u2014 and transcending labels<\/h2>\n<\/p>\n<p class=\"blocks-v1-Paragraph-__Paragraph__paragraph wp-block wp-block-paragraph container\" title=\"\">For many years, an open question has persisted of when major symphony orchestras would embrace women as music directors or full-time principal conductors. Despite high-profile figures like Marin Alsop and Nathalie Stutzmann, no woman had been appointed at one of the top seven U.S. orchestras until now.<\/p>\n<p class=\"blocks-v1-Paragraph-__Paragraph__paragraph wp-block wp-block-paragraph container\" title=\"\">In 2014, still in her 20s, Chan became the first woman to win the esteemed Donatella Flick Conducting Competition in England, bringing her global attention. Two years later, writing for <em>The Guardian<\/em>, she called for a de-emphasis on her gender.<\/p>\n<p class=\"blocks-v1-Paragraph-__Paragraph__paragraph wp-block wp-block-paragraph container\" title=\"\">\u201cI have felt there to be at times an imbalance of focus on my gender over my whole identity as a musician. I do not want to be given any special treatment because I am a woman,\u201d she wrote. \u201cI am proud of being a woman conductor, but I want to take the next step and go beyond any tags and be seen and valued as the same as my male colleagues.<\/p>\n<p class=\"blocks-v1-Paragraph-__Paragraph__paragraph wp-block wp-block-paragraph container\" title=\"\">Chan has also received attention as an Asian, making the Bay Area a natural fit; the region is home to one of the highest percentages of Asian Americans in the continental United States. In the same <em>Guardian<\/em> piece, she expressed a regard for talent over ethnic identity.<\/p>\n<p class=\"blocks-v1-Paragraph-__Paragraph__paragraph wp-block wp-block-paragraph container\" title=\"\">\u201cMy core priorities have always been and will always be the music and the audience, and I think audiences over the past two years have come to see me simply as Elim, rather than under the labels \u2018Asian\u2019 or \u2018female conductor.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><script async defer crossorigin='anonymous' src=\"https:\/\/connect.facebook.net\/en_US\/sdk.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p><em> \u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n<p><em> \u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.kqed.org \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>May 21, 2026 Updated 9:38 am PT In a historic move, Chan will become the first woman to lead one of the country\u2019s \u2018Big 7\u2019 orchestras. Elim Chan has been appointed the new Music Director of the San Francisco Symphony. The 39-year-old Hong Kong native has signed a six-year contract and will start in the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2426755,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25179],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2426754","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/San-Francisco-Symphony-Appoints-Elim-Chan-as-Music-Director.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2426754","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2426754"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2426754\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2426756,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2426754\/revisions\/2426756"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2426755"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2426754"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2426754"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2426754"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}