Leonard Edward Slatkin (born September 1, 1944) is an American conductor. Long associated with the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra, he is now music director of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.
His father Felix Slatkin was the violinist, conductor and founder of the Hollywood String Quartet, and his mother Eleanor Aller was cellist with the quartet. His brother, Frederick Zlotkin, is a cellist.
Slatkin was born to a musical family that came from are...
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Leonard Edward Slatkin (born September 1, 1944) is an American conductor. Long associated with the Saint Louis Symphony Orchestra, he is now music director of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra.
His father Felix Slatkin was the violinist, conductor and founder of the Hollywood String Quartet, and his mother Eleanor Aller was cellist with the quartet. His brother, Frederick Zlotkin, is a cellist.
Slatkin was born to a musical family that came from areas of the Russian Empire now in Ukraine. His brother Frederick traced the family's original name as Zlotkin, and adopted that form of the family surname for himself professionally. Frederick Zlotkin has spoken of the family lineage as follows:
"The Zlotkin/Slatkin lineage is Russian-Jewish. The first Zlotkin arrival to the US was Felix's father, grandpa Chaim Peretz Zlotkin, who came to settle with relatives in St. Louis in 1904; he (or the clerk at Ellis Island) changed the name. He probably came from the town of Mogilev [now Mohyliv...
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