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 Instruments: Piano  Languages: Armenian, Hebrew, Arabic, French, Greek, Turkish |
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BlogMehta was born into a Parsi family in Bombay, (now Mumbai), India, the son of Mehli and Tehmina Mehta. His father was a violinist and founding conductor of the Bombay Symphony Orchestra. Mehta is an alumnus of St. Mary's School, Mumbai, and St. Xavier's College, Mumbai. While in school, Mehta was taught to play the piano by Joseph de Lima, who was his first piano teacher. Mehta initially intended to study medicine, but eventually became a music student in Vienna at the age of 18, under Hans Swarowsky. Also at the same academy along with Mehta were conductor Claudio Abbado and conductor–pianist Daniel Barenboim. Mehta's first marriage was to Canadian soprano Carmen Lasky in 1958. They have a son, Mervon and a daughter, Zarina. In 1964, they divorced.[1] Two years after the divorce, Carmen married Mehta's brother, Zarin Mehta, formerly the Executive Director of the New York Philharmonic. In July 1969, Mehta married Nancy Kovack, a former American film and television actress.[2] Mehta, a permanent resident of the United States, retains his Indian citizenship. In 1958, Mehta made his conducting debut in Vienna. The same year he won the International Conducting Competition in Liverpool and was appointed assistant conductor of the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic. Mehta soon rose to the rank of chief conductor when he was made Music Director of the Montreal Symphony Orchestra in 1960, a post he held until 1967. In 1961, he was named assistant conductor of the Los Angeles Philharmonic; however, the orchestra's music director designate, Georg Solti, was not consulted on the appointment, and subsequently resigned in protest;[3] soon after, Mehta himself was named Music Director of the orchestra, and held the post from 1962 to 1978. In 1978 Mehta became the Music Director and Principal Conductor of the New York Philharmonic and remained there until his resignation in 1991, becoming the longest holder of the post. The Israel Philharmonic Orchestra (IPO) appointed Mehta its Music Advisor in 1969, Music Director in 1977, and made him its Music Director for Life in 1981.[4] Since 1985, Mehta has been chief conductor of the Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in Florence. Additionally, from 1998 until 2006, Mehta was Music Director of the Bavarian State Opera in Munich. The Munich Philharmonic named him its Honorary Conductor. Since 2005, Mehta has been the main conductor (together with Lorin Maazel) of the Palau de les Arts, the new opera house of the Ciutat de les Arts i les Ciències in Valencia, Spain. Mehta conducted the Vienna New Year's Concert in the years 1990, 1995, 1998 and 2007. He has also made a recording of Indian instrumentalist Ravi Shankar's Sitar Concerto No. 2, with Shankar and the London Philharmonic Orchestra.
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