Maggie Coe has been with the Mahler Chamber Orchestra since 2001; she began as an intern, then worked as production assistant, and in her current position as Project Manager she is responsible for all organisational matters involved in carrying out one of the MCO’s many projects all over the world.

Maggie grew up listening to classical music on the radio, playing trumpet and piano, and singing in various choirs near her home in a suburb of Boston, USA. After graduating from college with a degree in literature, she moved to Berlin. Bearing rudimentary German skills and without the faintest idea of what was in store for her, she appeared at the MCO office (which at the time consisted of just 4 staff members) and immediately assigned the task of sending out parts for entire operas like Pelleas et Melisande, Fidelio, and Wozzeck. Since then, her responsbilities have become more interesting and varied: from organizing cargo transports to New York to searching for the best way to get 50 people from Ludwigshafen to Naples in the space of 5 hours. In Berlin, Maggie is also a student of German literature at the Humboldt-Universität.

Maggie loves the way the orchestra reinvents itself for every project – each time the same, but always a little different. Not only is the program or the conductor different for each project, but also the acoustics of the hall, the layout of the city, the light in the hotel room, the food in the concert hall cafeteria, the language spoken by the audience members. All of these circumstances combine to keep the music flexible and fresh. In addition, the MCO has helped her, a person living away from the place where she grew up, to find new ways of understanding and defining home. And also, she thinks the MCO is a damn fine orchestra.