The Los Angeles Philharmonic Institute was a summer training program held in Los Angeles, California for conservatory aged orchestral instrumentalists and conductors. It ran from 1982 to 1991 under the auspices of the Los Angeles Philharmonic.
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History
The Los Angeles Philharmonic Institute was founded by Ernest Fleischmann and Leonard Bernstein, with Bernstein and Daniel Lewis serving as artistic directors. Subsequent artistic directors have included Michael Tilson Thomas, Sir Charles Groves, André Previn, Lukas Foss, and finally Lynn Harrell (1988–1992).
Most of the faculty were musicians from the Los Angeles Philharmonic, but also included many other prominent musicians, including Vladimir Spivakov, Nadja Salerno-Sonnenberg, Erich Leinsdorf, Edo de Waart, Leonard Slatkin, and Jesús López-Cobos, among others.
The Institute was notable for the amount of daily, hands-on instruction students received from faculty, even when compared to other similar summer programs, such as Tanglewood. Lynn Harrell said, "Not only do the students have an almost daily open working situation with Philharmonic players, but they'll have the opportunity to join them in performance [at the Hollywood Bowl].... To sit next to experienced orchestra musicians and play with that kind of immediacy is worth a thousand words. There's a give-and-take here on many levels."
In December 1991, Fleischmann announced that the 1992 Institute would be cancelled due to budget cuts by the Philharmonic.