NEW YORK (AP) — Matías Tarnopolsky will become president and CEO of the New York Philharmonic on Jan. 1 after six years heading the Philadelphia Orchestra, a hiring boosted by his long friendship with incoming music director Gustavo Dudamel.
Tarnopolsky's appointment was announced Monday. The 54-year-old, who has American, British and Argentine citizenship, fills a void created when Gary Ginstling quit in July just one season into the job.
“He’s done a really wonderful job with Philadelphia, and one of the most important issues was that he has a very close relationship with Gustavo Dudamel,” philharmonic co-chairman Peter W. May said. “That was really the most important factor for us.”
Born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Tarnopolsky played clarinet and received bachelor’s and master’s degrees in music and musicology from King's College, London. A performance of Mahler’s Fifth Symphony by Leonard Bernstein and the Vienna Philharmonic at the 1987 BBC Proms had an especially memorable impact.
Tarnopolsky worked as an assistant publication editor at the BBC Proms from 1994-96 and as producer of the BBC Symphony Orchestra from 1996-99 before moving to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in 1999 as senior director of programming.
He was the New York Philharmonic's vice president of artistic planning from December 2005 until August 2009, then spent nine years as executive director of Cal Performances at Berkeley until moving to Philadelphia in August 2018. Cal hosted Dudamel and the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra in several residencies.
“This is a full circle moment because in a funny way this started when I used to work at the New York Philharmonic and I went to visit a conductor called Gustavo Dudamel in his home country of Venezuela, went to Caracas to visit him, and we immediately hit it off,” Tarnopolsky said. “I watched him work with the kids of the Simón Bolivar and was just blown away, and so we invited him to conduct the New York Philharmonic. So this is a story almost two decades in the making.”
Ginstling joined the New York Philharmonic as executive director from Washington's National Symphony Orchestra in November 2022, when it was announced he would succeed Deborah Borda as CEO the following July 1. Ginstling's resignation was announced this past July 11.
“Frankly, it just wasn’t a good fit from both Gary's perspective and our perspective," May said. "Matías clearly had significantly more experience than Gary has had in terms of leading one of the top orchestras in the country and we're quite confident that this is the right guy for the job.”
Philharmonic co-chairman Oscar L. Tang said Tarnopolsky is aligned with the vision held by Dudamel and the board.
“Gustavo says that he feels classical music is a human right and he wants to view classical music as a force for social development, social good,” Tang said. “These are some of the aspirations that Peter and I have for the New York Phil in terms of extending its role in the cultural and civic life of New York City and really the country and the world.”
Aspen Leadership Group, which assisted on the search that led to Gintsling's hiring, worked with a six-member search committee to identify about a half-dozen candidates.
“This is just the right appointment at just the right time,” said Borda, who has remained with the orchestra as executive adviser to the CEO and the board. “We've worked hard over the past six months to clear I think a good pathway for Matías.”
The New York Philharmonic returned to renovated Geffen Hall in October 2022, announced Dudamel’s hiring four months later, agreed to a three-year labor contract with its musicians this September and last month fired two players after accusations of sexual misconduct and abuse of power.
Borda said guest conductors have been engaged and a tour has been arranged for Dudamel's first season, with his approval, but much of the 2026-27 programming remains open.
“Here’s a chance that comes along maybe once in a lifetime to author a completely new chapter for a great musical institution,” Tarnopolsky said. “The commitment here is to rededicate ourselves to ensuring the philharmonic’s place in the civic, cultural, musical, educational life of contemporary New York.”
Ryan Fleur, the Philadelphia Orchestra's executive director, will become its interim president on Jan. 1, a role he held for eight months in 2018 between Allison Vulgamore's departure and Tarnopolsky's arrival.
This story corrects that Matías Tarnopolsky headed Philadelphia Orchestra six years.
This image released by The Philadelphia Orchestra shows Matías Tarnopolsky in Philadelphia. Tarnopolsky will become president and CEO of the New York Philharmonic on Jan. 1 after four years heading the Philadelphia Orchestra. (Jeff Fusco/The Philadelphia Orchestra via AP)
INDIANAPOLIS (AP) — Two Indianapolis police officers charged in the death of a Black man — who was shocked with a Taser during a mental health crisis — acted “recklessly" by restraining him face down longer than necessary, a prosecutor said during opening statements Monday.
Officers Adam Ahmad and Steven Sanchez were indicted by a grand jury in April 2023 in Herman Whitfield III’s 2022 death. They are being tried together as co-defendants for what's expected to be a five-day trial.
Both men face one felony count each of involuntary manslaughter, reckless homicide, battery resulting in serious bodily injury and battery resulting in moderate injury, and one misdemeanor battery charge.
Daniel Cicchini, the chief trial deputy for the Marion County Prosecutor's Office, said in his opening statement that Ahmad and Sanchez held Whitfield face down on the floor of his parents’ dining room longer than was necessary while he was being handcuffed.
Cicchini said the officers' actions left the man, who was obese, “unable to breathe."
“Essentially his heart and lungs could no longer function properly,” Cicchini told the jury. "When they kept him in that position they did so recklessly.”
He also told the jurors that the two officers' actions were “a substantial deviation from their training.”
But Mason Riley, an attorney for Ahmad and Sanchez, said during his opening statement that Whitfield suffered from an enlarged heart. He said Whitfield, who weighed 389 pounds (176 kilograms) according to his autopsy, had died “before the handcuffing concluded.”
“Neither of them have committed a single criminal act,” Riley said of the co-defendants.
He also said neither officer, nor other officers who responded to the family's home, heard Whitfield say he could not breathe.
Ahmad, 32, and Sanchez, 35, were indicted after Whitfield’s family had spent nearly a year demanding that police release full body camera videos of his encounter with officers and called for the firing of up to six officers. Both officers remain on administrative duty with the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department.
Whitfield’s parents had called 911 on April 25, 2022, and reported that their 39-year-old son, a gifted pianist, was in the throes of a mental health crisis at the family’s Indianapolis home.
The videos of the police response to the Whitfield home were released in January 2023 and document Whitfield's final moments alive during a chaotic encounter with police.
Responding officers found Whitfield naked and pacing inside the home. Body camera videos show officers trying to convince Whitfield to put on clothing so he could be taken to a hospital. But Whitfield did not dress, and he avoided contact with the officers, moving from room to room.
Whitfield is eventually seen running past a dining room table before Sanchez shocks him with a Taser and Whitfield falls to the floor, toppling furniture. Sanchez, Ahmad and other officers are seen holding a struggling Whitfield face down on the floor while they work to handcuff him.
Whitfield can be heard saying “can't breathe” a few times and exclaiming before he eventually falls silent. When officers rolled the handcuffed Whitfield over, he was unresponsive. He was pronounced dead at a hospital.
The first witness called Monday was Dominque Clark, one of the first officers to arrive at the Whitfield home. Jurors were shown her body camera video, starting with her arrival at the scene with Ahmad already inside the home.
Clark testified that after the officers Tasered and handcuffed Whitfield, she did not hear him say he could not breathe and she also did not hear him gasping for breath. Clark also said she felt that the officers were not using “maximal restraint” as they had their hands on Whitfield while he was being handcuffed.
“I would not say ‘holding him down.’ I would say they were making contact,” Whitfield, she said.
The Marion County Coroner’s Office ruled Whitfield’s death a homicide. An autopsy lists his cause of death as “cardiopulmonary arrest in the setting of law enforcement subdual, prone restraint, and conducted electrical weapon use.”
The coroner's office listed “morbid obesity” and “hypertensive cardiovascular disease” as contributing factors in his death.
The officers’ attorneys had sought to have the charges dismissed against both men, arguing in part that the grand jury proceedings were “defective” and that “the facts stated do not constitute an offense.”
The court dismissed a second count of involuntary manslaughter Sanchez had faced, but it allowed the remaining charges against the officers to proceed to trial, said John Kautzman, one of the officers' attorneys.
He said the involuntary manslaughter charge that was dismissed involved Sanchez's use of a Taser against Whitfield.
A civil lawsuit filed by Whitfield's family against the city of Indianapolis and six police officers, including Ahmad, Sanchez and Clark, states that Whitfield “died because of the force used against him” and calls the force used against him “unreasonable and excessive.”
“Mr. Whitfield needed professional mental health care, not the use of excessive force,” the filing said.
The family is seeking unspecified damages. That civil case is set for trial in July 2025 in federal court in Indianapolis.
This undated photo provided by Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department shows officer Steven Sanchez. (Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department via AP)
This undated photo provided by Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department shows officer Adam Ahmad. (Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department via AP)
This undated photo provided by Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department shows officer Adam Ahmad. (Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department via AP)
This undated photo provided by Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department shows officer Steven Sanchez. (Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department via AP)
This undated photo provided by Hilary Close shows Herman Whitfield III, who died in the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department custody on April 25, 2022. (Hilary Close via AP)
This undated photo provided by Hilary Close shows Herman Whitfield III, who died in the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department custody on April 25, 2022. (Hilary Close via AP)
