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Stéphane Denève Conductor

Music Director, Royal Scottish National Orchestra

Stéphane Denève, recognized internationally as a conductor of the highest calibre, is currently in his fifth season as Music Director of the Royal Scottish National Orchestra. He gave his inaugural concert as Music Director in September 2005 and has since won unanimous praise from audiences and critics alike for his performances and programming. He has conducted the RSNO at the BBC Proms, Edinburgh International Festival, Festival Présences in Paris and at the Vienna Konzerthaus, and together they were awarded the prestigious Diapason d'Or de l'année in 2007 for the first in their series of recordings of the works of Albert Roussel for Naxos. The second disc in the series was released in 2008 to widespread critical acclaim and the third disc will be released in November 2009.

A graduate of the Paris Conservatoire where he was awarded a unanimous First Prize in 1995, Stéphane Denève began his career as Sir Georg Solti's assistant for Bluebeard's Castle with the Orchestre de Paris (1995) and Don Giovanni at the Paris National Opera (1996). He also assisted Georges Prêtre for Turandot at the Paris National Opera (1997) and Seiji Ozawa for Dialogues des Carmélites at the Saito Kinen Festival (1998).

At home in a broad range of repertoire and a champion of new music, Stéphane Denève has a particular affinity with the music of his native France, and has conducted works by Grétry, Debussy, Ravel, Berlioz, Roussel, Fauré, and Poulenc. In recent years he has also premiered a number of works by the contemporary French composer Guillaume Connesson.

Highlights of the past season have included debuts with the BBC Symphony, NDR Symphony Hamburg, Maggio Musicale Florence, San Francisco Symphony and Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra, and returns to the Los Angeles Philharmonic and the Philadelphia Orchestra.

Stéphane Denève has also appeared as a guest conductor with the Orchestre de Paris, Orchestre National de France, Philharmonia Orchestra, Zürich Tonhalle Orchestra, Deutsches Symphonie Orchester Berlin, Czech Philharmonic, Hong Kong Philharmonic, Sydney Symphony, Melbourne Symphony, Gothenburg Symphony, Russian National Orchestra, St. Petersburg Philharmonic, Swedish Radio Symphony, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, the Rotterdam Philharmonic and the Verdi Orchestra Milan. In North America, he has conducted the Cleveland Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, Pittsburgh Symphony, National Symphony Orchestra Washington, Cincinnati Symphony, Dallas Symphony, Montreal Symphony, Toronto Symphony, Houston Symphony, St. Louis Symphony, the Minnesota Orchestra, and the Indianapolis and Seattle Symphony Orchestras.

Stéphane Denève enjoys close relationships with many of the world's leading solo artists, and has performed, among others, with Natalie Dessay, Nina Stemme, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Piotr Anderszewski, Leif Ove Andsnes, Lars Vogt, Nikolai Lugansky, Emanuel Ax, Frank Peter Zimmermann, Nikolaj Znaider, Pinchas Zukerman, Leonidas Kavakos, Vadim Repin and Gil Shaham.

In the field of opera, Stéphane Denève has conducted productions at the Royal Opera House (Così fan tutte), Glyndebourne Festival (Carmen), Netherlands Opera (L' amour des trois oranges), La Monnaie (La traviata; La voix humaine), Opéra National de Paris (Don Quichotte; La bohème; Le nozze di Figaro), the Teatro Comunale Bologna (Béatrice et Bénédict), and Cincinnati Opera (Erwartung; Carmen; Bluebeard's Castle).

Highlights in 2009/10 include a major European tour with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra and Hilary Hahn to Paris, Munich, Vienna, Luxembourg, Baden-Baden and Belgrade; debuts with Barcelona Symphony and Danish National Symphony; and returns to the Philharmonia Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic and Rotterdam Philharmonic. In June 2010 he makes his debut at La Scala Milan, conducting Gounod's Faust.

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