After initially learning to play the piano Edo de Waart took up the oboe, studying this instrument with Haakon Stotijn at the Amsterdam Conservatory where he also studied conducting with Spaanderman. In 1960 he was a member of Dean Dixon’s conducting seminar at Salzburg and the following year he was appointed co-principal oboe of the Amsterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, before graduating from the Conservatory in 1962. He was appointed co-principal oboe of the Amsterdam Concertgebouw Orchestra in 1963, but following his participation in a conducting course with Franco Ferrara at Hilversum, he made his conducting debut in 1964 with the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra and went on to win the Dimitri Mitropoulos Conducting Competition in the same year. ...