Paul Freeman (conductor)

Did You Know?

• Freeman died in Victoria, British Columbia, with his wife Cornelia and son Douglas at his side.
• A private ceremony was planned in Canada along with a public memorial service in Chicago in September 2015.
• His death at age 79 was due to recent health issues and long-term physical challenges.

Career and education

Freeman earned bachelor, master, and doctoral degrees from the Eastman School of Music. A Fulbright Scholarship allowed him to study for two years at the Hochshule für Musik in Berlin with Ewald Lindemann, and he later studied conducting with Pierre Monteux at the American Symphony Orchestra. While a graduate student at Eastman, he began his conducting career as music director of the Opera Theatre of Rochester for six years. He then served as associate conductor of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra from 1968 to 1970 and of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra from 1970 to 1979, followed by a stint as principal guest conductor of the Helsinki Philharmonic. From 1979 to 1988 he was music director of the Victoria Symphony in Canada. In 1987 he founded the Chicago Sinfonietta, remaining its musical director until his retirement in 2011, and concurrently held the post of music director and chief conductor of the Czech National Symphony Orchestra in Prague from 1996. After retiring from the Chicago Sinfonietta, he was named emeritus music director.

Archives

Freeman's papers are held at the Center for Black Music Research at Columbia College Chicago as the Paul Freeman Conductor Scores, Recordings, and Other Material collection, spanning 1987–2009 and including 58 boxes of annotated scores, audio and video recordings, and a small amount of personal papers. Additional papers are at the University of Victoria Special Collections and University Archives, containing 6 boxes of audio recordings, video cassettes, and personal papers such as yearbooks and photo prints, along with many annotated scores. Related records like Victoria Symphony programs and published recordings with Freeman are available through the UVic Libraries.

Recordings

Paul Freeman is widely regarded as a highly successful American recording conductor. In the 1970s, he created a nine-LP series for Columbia Records exploring Black symphonic composers from 1750 onward, later reissued as a ten-CD Sony Classical box set in 2019. He worked with pianist Derek Han to record complete cycles of Mozart, Haydn, and Beethoven piano concertos. Freeman has participated in more than a dozen television productions across North America and Europe and has earned two Emmy Award nominations.