Near a Breakthrough at the Baltimore Symphony By JEREMY EICHLER (NYTIMES)

The conducting podiums of large American orchestras have historically been an all-male province, but the Baltimore Symphony may finally be changing that. On Wednesday, a 21-member search committee voted to make the American conductor Marin Alsop the orchestra’s next music director. If her appointment is ratified by the orchestra’s board on Tuesday, she will become the first woman to lead a major American orchestra.

Ms. Alsop, 48, is currently principal conductor of the Bournemouth Symphony Orchestra in England, but insiders have long speculated that a major American post was on its way. Her three-year contract with  Baltimore, which has not been finalized, states that she would serve as music director designate starting in the 2006-7 season and begin her official tenure in the fall of 2007, said James Glicker, president and chief executive of the Baltimore Symphony. She would succeed Yuri Temirkanov, now in his sixth
season with the orchestra.

"I’m absolutely thrilled," Ms. Alsop said yesterday from a cruise off the coast of New England. "I’m very honored to be able to be the first woman to have this position, and I’m hoping it will soon become a  nonissue for the women who follow me."

Deborah Borda, president of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, said that if the appointment goes through, "it would be a great leap forward and a significant moment in American musical history."

It would be highly unusual for an orchestra’s board to reject the recommendation of the search committee, which was headed by the board chairman and included six other board members, as well as orchestral staff, musicians and an outside consultant. Ms. Alsop’s probable appointment was first reported yesterday in The Baltimore Sun.

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