In 1962, the State Department sponsored a cultural exchange tour and engaged DePreist as an American specialist in music. The tour was to cover the Near and the Far East with DePreist lecturing and performing jazz. While on tour in Thailand and attending a Bangkok orchestra rehearsal, he was asked if he wanted to conduct. This experience caused DePreist to realize he wanted to be a conductor. During the tour DePreist contracted poliomyelitis. However he recovered sufficiently, allowing him to enter and to ultimately claim first prize in the Dimitri Mitropoulos International Conducting Competition. He was then chosen by Leonard Bernstein to become assistant conductor of the New York Philharmonic during the 1965–66 season. DePreist made his highly acclaimed European debut with the Rotterdam Philharmonic in 1969, then made appearances with other European orchestras in Amsterdam, Belgium, Berlin, Italy, Munich, Stockholm and Stuttgart. In 1971, Antal Doráti named him associate conductor of the National Symphony Orchestra in Washington, D.C. In 1976, DePreist was appointed music director of the Orchestre Symphonique de Québec, a position he held until 1983. In 1980, DePreist was named music director of the Oregon Symphony, a position he held until 2003. During his 23-year tenure, he led the transformation of the Oregon Symphony from a small, part-time orchestra to a nationally recognized group with a number of recordings. Peter Frajola, a principal violinist who joined the orchestra in the 1980s recalled "phenomenal musical journeys" with DePreist whose influence reached far beyond the music hall into the community. He was the symphony's ninth music director and was succeeded by Carlos Kalmar. His other leadership roles with orchestras include tenures with the Orchestre Symphonique de Québec, the Malmö Symphony Orchestra in Sweden, and the Monte-Carlo Philharmonic Orchestra. He also served as artistic advisor to the Pasadena Symphony. As guest conductor, DePreist appeared with every major North American orchestra, including the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Symphony of the New World, and Juilliard Orchestra. He also led orchestras in Helsinki, Rome, Sydney, Tokyo, London, and many other cities. DePreist made over 50 recordings, including a Shostakovich symphony cycle with the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra as well as 15 recordings with the Oregon Symphony, with such works as Sergei Rachmaninoff's Symphony No. 2.
During DePreist's stay in Japan as the permanent conductor of the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra, his name and likeness were used in the Japanese manga and anime, Nodame Cantabile, in which he was the musical director of the fictional Roux-Marlet Orchestra, and hired the series protagonist Shinichi Chiaki as the orchestra's new resident conductor. DePreist also conducted the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra to provide the music for both the anime and the live action drama. In 1987, DePreist, who had been high school friends with Bill Cosby, was commissioned to rearrange the theme song to The Cosby Show.
He was married to Ginette DePreist. DePreist had two daughters, Tracy and Jennifer, from his first marriage to Betty Childress. In 2012, DePreist suffered a heart attack, from which he never fully recovered. He died on February 8, 2013, at the age of 76, in Scottsdale, Arizona and is interred at Eden Cemetery in Collingdale, Pennsylvania.
Publications
DePreist published two books of poetry: The Precipice Garden and The Distant Siren.
