Creative Collaborators
In addition to Music & Artistic Director Gustavo Dudamel, the LA Phil’s direction comes from a collaborative team of creative leaders, including the following remarkable artists.
Zubin Mehta
Conductor Emeritus
Zubin Mehta – the LA Phil’s Music Director from 1962-1978 and now Conductor Emeritus – is one of the greatest musicians of our time. He has conducted the world’s most esteemed orchestras and introduced generations to classical music through than 50 years of recordings and performances. Through his humanitarian work, he has also given us a model of music’s ability to bridge cultures and bring people together in healing and in harmony.
Esa-Pekka Salonen
Conductor Laureate
After serving as Music Director since 1992, Esa-Pekka Salonen was named Conductor Laureate of the LA Phil in 2009. A renowned composer, he combines intricacy and technical virtuosity with playful rhythmic and melodic innovations, marking him as one of the most important artists in classical music today.
Susanna Mälkki
Principal Guest Conductor
Susanna Mälkki, the LA Phil’s Principal Guest Conductor, is a highly regarded, internationally distinguished artist whose exceptional conducting talent has taken her to symphony and chamber orchestras, contemporary music ensembles, and opera houses around the world.
Paolo Bortolameolli
Associate Conductor
Praised by composer George Crumb for his “sensitive and insightful interpretation,” conductor Paolo Bortolameolli brings a visual and collaborative approach to music that is infused by his fascination for and interplay among the arts. With his passion for connecting the 21st-century audience to the concert stage, Bortolameolli enjoys conducting orchestral music, working with youth orchestras, collaborating with today’s composers, lecturing, and writing.
John Adams
Creative Chair
John Adams, one of the most admired and respected composers in North America and winner of the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for Music, serves as creative chair of the LA Phil. Over the past 25 years, his music has played a decisive role in the shaping of contemporary music, and his compositions have been performed by major orchestras around the world.
Herbie Hancock
Creative Chair for Jazz
Herbie Hancock is an icon of modern music. Over his illustrious five-decade career, he has won 14 Grammy® awards, and his spirit helped to define both post-war jazz and hip-hop. Few artists have had greater influence on acoustic and electronic jazz and R&B.
Past Collaborators
Past Artist-Collaborator, Yuval Sharon
Yuval concluded his three-year residency with the LA Phil in June, 2019. For three seasons, Sharon took the LA Phil on journeys spiritual, metaphorical, cross-cultural, and interplanetary.
Learn MorePast YOLA (Youth Orchestra Los Angeles) Conductor, Juan Felipe Molano
Graduated with special honors as an orchestral and opera conductor from the Vienna Conservatory, Juan Felipe Molano served as the conductor for YOLA from 2014 to 2018.
Learn More About Juan