Münchner Philharmoniker & Christian Thielemann

The Münchner Philharmoniker (Munich Philharmonic) is an orchestra with a troubled past but a bright future. Tainted by its association with Nazism during World War II, the orchestra was led in the early 1980s by the notoriously mercurial Sergiu Celibidache. Although it had roots stretching back to the beginning of the 19th century, the Munich Philharmonic really began in 1893 with establishment of the Kaim Orchestra, founded by a private donor of that name. During World War I, the orchestra foundered, and after the war it was taken over by Munich's city government and given th...