Walter Weller
AustriaBiography of Walter Weller
Walter Weller was an Austrian violinist and conductor. He was born into a musical family, as his father was a violinist in the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra. Weller himself joined this renowned ensemble at the age of 17 and shared the position of concertmaster with Willy Boskovsky at the age of 22, a position he held until 1972.
In addition to his role in the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra, Weller also led his own string quartet from 1958 to 1969. During this time, he began taking conducting lessons from Josef Krips and made his conducting debut in 1966. From 1969 onwards, Weller regularly conducted orchestras in both of Vienna's main opera houses.
Weller served as the general music director of Duisburg from 1971 to 1972 and went on to lead several European orchestras. He was the conductor of the Tonkünstler Orchestra from 1975 to 1977, the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra from 1977 to 1980, the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra from 1980 to 1985, and the Scottish National Orchestra from 1991 to 1996. His tenure with the Scottish National Orchestra was so successful that his image was featured on a special edition £50 banknote issued by the Bank of Scotland.
From 1994, Weller also conducted the Basel Symphony Orchestra, and in 2007, he became the principal conductor of the National Orchestra of Belgium. Weller's notable recordings as a conductor include the First and Ninth Symphonies of Dmitri Shostakovich with the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, as well as the symphonies of Sergei Prokofiev with the London Symphony Orchestra and the London Philharmonic Orchestra.
While Weller is recognized as a specialist in Mozart and Beethoven, he also made significant contributions to the repertoire. In 1988, he premiered the so-called Tenth Symphony of Beethoven, a 15-minute composition reconstructed from Beethoven's drafts by Scottish musicologist Barry Cooper, with the Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra.
