Juanjo Mena Conducts Debussy and Ginastera ^2023-2024

Juanjo Mena began his career in his native Spain, as Music Director of the Bilbao Symphony Orchestra. In 2011, he was named Chief Conductor of the BBC Philharmonic, touring Europe and Asia and performing at the BBC Proms in Royal Albert Hall. Highlights included all Bruckner symphonies, a cycle of Schubert symphonies as well Spanish and South American repertoires.
Mena has conducted most of the leading orchestras in Europe and North America. In the current season, he returns to New York for a Lincoln Center gala concert with the Teatro Real Orchestra, which makes its Lincoln Center debut. He also returns to the New York Philharmonic, Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, the Detroit and Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestras, as well as the BBC Philharmonic, Gürzenich Orchestra, Spanish National Orchestra and Barcelona Symphony Orchestra. Juanjo Mena concluded his six-year tenure as Principal Conductor of the Cincinnati May Festival, where he expanded commissioning of new works and developed the Festival community.

Jennifer Swartz continues to be passionate about performing music and sharing her love for harp and music through teaching. After one year as principal harpist with with Calgary Philharmonic, Jennifer became the OSM’s principal harpist in 1994. Her career as a classical harpist embodies solo, chamber and orchestral playing and she can be heard on various recordings in each of these contexts. Jennifer is the professor of harp at the Schulich School of Music at McGill University and she is on the faculty of the Orford Academy. It is particularly meaningful to Jennifer to be able to perform Alberto Ginastera’s Harp Concerto with her OSM family.