“Right from our first rehearsal,” Gimeno, 42, said in an email, he identified with the “sound and the musical intelligence of the orchestra.”

A former principal percussionist with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam, he began his international conducting career in 2012 as the Concertgebouw’s assistant conductor under Mariss Jansons. He made his debut conducting the orchestra in 2014, standing in for Jansons, and his international conducting career took off.

He will begin in Toronto during the 2020-21 season, succeeding Peter Oundjian, who became its conductor emeritus in June after 14 years as its music director. Sir Andrew Davis will be the orchestra’s interim artistic director through the 2019-20 season.

Gimeno became the music director of the Luxembourg Philharmonic Orchestra in 2015, and has conducted the Cleveland Orchestra, the Los Angeles Philharmonic. He will make his debut with the Zurich Opera in 2019 conducting a production of Verdi’s “Rigoletto.”

Matthew Loden, the chief executive officer of the Toronto Symphony, said in a statement that Gimeno’s arrival “underscores our commitment to amplifying the energy and cosmopolitan profile of this great city.”

Gimeno said in the email that he looked forward to exploring a wide range of repertoire in Toronto, including “the music of today, particularly the voices that need to be heard in Canada right now.” And he said he was eager to work with the city’s diverse communities.

“This is a city where every neighborhood feels like a unique slice of the world, which means there are endless moments of inspiration from these cultures that need to be a part of how we present our music,” he said. “I can’t wait to get started.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

Michael Cooper © 2018 The New York Times