Arnold Östman
| Arnold Östman | |
|---|---|
| Born |
24 December 1939 Malmö, Sweden |
| Occupation | Conductor |
| Years active | 1971–present |
Arnold Östman, born on December 24, 1939 in Malmö, is a Swedish conductor and music director.
Östman studied art history and musicology at Lund, Paris and Stockholm. As a musician, he concentrated on the piano and the harpsichord, being largely self-taught. During his years as a researcher, he focused on the subject of early opera, bringing to light a number of theretofore unknown or little-known baroque operas.
Östman was a teacher at the (then called the Statens musikdramatiska skola) in 1969. He was theatre and museum director at the Drottningholms Teatermuseum (later known as Sveriges Teatermuseum) in Stockholm starting in 1979.
Östman was artistic director and conductor of the Vadstena-Akademien from 1971until 1981, while also serving as conductor and artistic director of the NorrlandsOperan in Umeå from 1974 until 1978.
He was made artistic director of the Drottningholm Palace Theatre in 1980 and remained in that role until 1992. He gained an international reputation as a champion of the period performance movement in classical music, a movement that insists on the performance of repertoire from c. 1600 to 1820 (i.e., baroque, classical, and early romantic) using instruments (or modern replicas), techniques, and stylistic sensibilities from the appropriate period. In particular, Drottningholm's productions of Mozart operas with period instruments caused a considerable stir in the early days of the historical-performance movement. To Östman, use of historically appropriate instruments is vital to developing an understanding of the Mozartian style:
It's so important to use classical instruments. We make mistakes with them, but we keep trying because it is really important complementary information, which has a scientific value. Yet we don't use it as Scientists, we use it for artistic freedom. The more information you have, the more freedom you have.
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