The music world lost a talented and passionate opera conductor, coach, professor and pianist when Timothy J. Lindberg passed away on March 3, 2003. According to Lindberg’s life-partner Gilbert Mendoza, “Tim serenely left this world after succumbing to complications from cancer.”
Lindberg’s opera career, which spanned two decades, began at Indiana University where he studied piano, was a Concerto Competition Winner and earned the University’s Performer’s Certificate. While at IU he played lessons for legendary soprano Eileen Farrell, who encouraged him to pursue opera conducting which is where he focused his career.
Lindberg made his conducting debut at New York’s Town Hall in 1987 with Rossini’s II Viaggio a Reims. Lindberg’s debut and his performances with The PALA Opera Association’s productions of Rossini’s La Gazza Ladra and La Donna del Lago were met with critical acclaim. Of this performance Andrew Porter of The New Yorker wrote, “Maestro Lindberg is as able a Rossini conductor as I have heard in years.”
Lindberg has conducted with the Lake George Opera Festival, Toledo Opera, Cleveland Lyric Opera, Syracuse Opera, Harrisburg Opera, Amarillo Opera, and the Newport Music Festival in addition to the many productions he has cast and conducted with Opera Idaho where he served as Music Director then Artistic Director from 1993-2001. Lindberg conducted Barber’s Vanessa at New York’s Dicapo Opera Theatre. Anthony Tomasini of The New York Times wrote, “Maestro Lindberg led an intrepid performance of this difficult opera where the sweep and impact of the work came through.” He was a regular guest conductor for the Dicapo Opera Theatre, having conducted Britten’s the Turn of the Screw and Tchaikovsky’s Iolanta in previous seasons.
Maestro Lindberg has served as cover conductor for the Deutsche Oper Berlin and as chorus master and cover conductor for numerous Glimmerglass Opera productions. He has worked as assistant conductor for the New York City Opera National Tour, Sarasota Opera, Seattle Opera, and Pittsburgh Opera. He has also toured as accompanist for soprano Roberta Peters. Lindberg also served as music director of the PALA Opera Association and Liederkranz Foundation Orchestra.
Since 1998, Lindberg served as an Assistant Professor and Music Director of the Opera Program at the Flora L. Thornton School of Music at the University of Southern California, Los Angeles. Lindberg was a passionate, dedicated and influential professor and his passion for teaching made a vital difference in his students’ lives.
A devoted USC student, performer and fan of Lindberg summed up the gratitude that Artistic Director Timothy Lindberg deserves when she stated, “Thank you for your passion, for your talent, for your desire to make music. You will live on in us forever.”
