The symphony has meant much to Dudamel and to the L.A. Phil. The L.A. Phil music director at the time was Otto Klemperer, who had been an assistant to Mahler, as had Bruno Walter, who also moved to Los Angeles. The L.A. Phil program lists the orchestra’s first performance of Mahler’s Ninth as 1969, when John Barbirolli led a death-stalked performance eight months before his own death. Many of the finest recordings of the Ninth are by conductors who were L.A. Phil music directors (Klemperer, Guilini and Esa-Pekka Salonen) or principal guest conductors (Michael Tilson Thomas and Simon Rattle), but none is with the L.A. Phil. ----------Gustavo Dudamel conducts the L.A. Phil in Mahler’s Symphony No.

Source: Los Angeles Times October 21, 2016 21:55 UTC