Ojai's Next Artistic & Executive Director

The Ojai Music Festival has chosen Teddy Abrams, music director of the Louisville Orchestra among other claims to fame, to succeed Ara Guzelimian as artistic and executive director, starting in 2027. Guzelimian will oversee the 2026 event, featuring Esa-Pekka Salonen as music director.

On the surface, it’s a strange choice. Abrams is less known for his administrative skills than his socio-musical ones and, at 40, far less seasoned than his well-travelled recent predecessors: Guzelimian, who ran the festival from 1992-97 and again from 2020-26; Thomas Morris, who arrived after years running the Cleveland Orchestra; and Ernest Fleischmann who had long ruled over the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

But Abrams is a rather different animal, perceived by many as the great hope of classical music’s future, a kind of pied-piper for the artform, not only reviving the Louisville Orchestra to its former artistic-pioneering status, but bringing it into the countryside, community, and even the caves of Kentucky. He’s also a Grammy-winning composer. Abrams was Musical America’s 2022 Conductor of the Year.

“Teddy Abrams is one of today’s most striking ambassadors for the impact the arts can have on building community,” Ojai Music Festival Board Chairman Jerry Eberhardt commented. “His artistic sensibilities, collegial spirit, and boundless energy position him as the ideal leader for the Ojai Music Festival as it enters its eighth decade.” Eberhardt noted Abrams’s “resounding success” in “increasing access and building community through music,” and expressed confidence that he would similarly “reach across generations” to build Ojai’s artistic and demographic profile.

Eberhardt was also quick to express his “boundless gratitude for Ara Guzelimian’s generous, steady leadership.” Guzelimian announced his intention to step down last May. He called the choice of his successor "a deeply considered decision" by Ojai’s board,

Declaring the festival “one of the brightest lights in the music world today,” Abrams noted that it had been the site of his mentor Michael Tilson Thomas’s early career successes.  “It is where Copland and Stravinsky shared their work, and it is the place that has brought to life the dreams of many of the greatest musicians of the past 80 years. The Ojai Music Festival represents creativity, adventure, and daring…these are my deepest values too.”