Leon Botstein

Leon Botstein (born December 14, 1946 in Zürich, Switzerland) is a Swiss-American conductor, educator, and scholar serving as the President of Bard College.

Biography

1946–1975: Early life, education, and career

Botstein was born in Zürich, Switzerland in 1946. The son of Polish-Jewish physicians, Botstein immigrated to New York City at the age of two. Interested in music from an early age, he studied violin with Roman Totenberg and, during the summers, studied with faculty from the National Conservatory in Mexico City. At the age of sixteen, Botstein graduated from the High School of Music and Art in Manhattan, and earned a bachelor's degree from the University of Chicago, where he graduated in history and philosophy. While an undergraduate, he was concertmaster and assistant conductor of the University orchestra and founded University of Chicago’s chamber orchestra. His music teachers at University of Chicago included the Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Richard Wernick and the musicologists H. Colin Slim and Howard Mayer Brown. In 1967, after studying at Tanglewood, Botstein then went to Harvard University, where he studied history under David Landes, writing on musical life of Vienna in the 19th and early 20th centuries. At Harvard University, he was the assistant conductor of the Harvard Radcliffe Orchestra, and conductor of the Doctors’ Orchestra of Boston. In 1969, while still a graduate student, Botstein was awarded a Sloan Foundation Fellowship and began work for New York City Mayor John V. Lindsay’s administration as special assistant to the president of the Board of Education of the City of New York. In 1970, at the age of 23, Botstein became the youngest college president in history after his appointment as president of the now-defunct Franconia College in New Hampshire. He was offered the position after meeting his future father-in-law, Oliver Lundquist, who was on the board of trustees. While there Botstein founded the White Mountain Music Festival, an offshoot of which is still operating today.

1975–1990: Developing Bard and return to music

In 1975, Botstein left Franconia to become the president of Bard College, a position he still holds. Botstein oversaw significant curricular changes, and, under his leadership, Bard saw record gains in enrollment, campus growth, endowment, institutional reach, and high-profile faculty. Botstein directed the launch of the Levy Economics Institute, a public-policy research center, as well as graduate programs in the fine arts, decorative arts, environmental policy, and curatorial studies; soon thereafter, he helped acquire Bard College at Simon's Rock and later founded Bard High School Early College, which currently operates in seven cities: Newark, New York City, Cleveland, Washington D.C., Baltimore, New Orleans