Guido Ajmone-Marsan

Guido Ajmone-Marsan, who died recently after a long illness, aged 67, was an Italian-American conductor who excelled in a wide range of repertoire, and who had a particular affinity with the great Italian operas of Verdi and Puccini. He was a person of great charm and warmth, and his talent as a young conductor brought him to the attention of the great Franco Ferrara, teacher of many of today’s greatest maestros. Ferrara considered him to be one of his most outstanding students. Propelled into prominence at the age of 22, he won a major conducting competition in Florence, closely followed by successes in the Cantelli and Mitropolous competitions, the latter of which brought him to the attention of Leonard Bernstein, with whom he later shared the stage conducting the orchestra of