Tugan Sokhiev, Musical Director

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Tugan Sokhiev is rapidly establishing an international reputation, and is in demand from opera houses and orchestras worldwide. He has a close association with the Mariinsky Theatre, appears as guest conductor with a number of international orchestras and at the beginning of the 2005/6 season he became Principal Guest Conductor and Artistic Adviser of the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse. Since September 2008, he is now Musical Director of the orchestra.

Since taking up the post with the Orchestre National du Capitole, he has conducted critically acclaimed concerts in Toulouse, Vienna, Ljubljana, Zagreb, San Sebastian and Paris, where he was awarded the ‘Révélation musicale de l'année’ by the French Critics’ Union for his concert with Magdalena Kozena at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées.  He made his first recording with the orchestra in Summer 2006 (Tchaikovsky Fourth Symphony and Mussorgsky Pictures) and will release his second recording in late 2007.

Sokhiev was born in Vladikavkaz, North Ossetia in 1977 and studied at the St Petersburg State Conservatory.  A pupil of the late Professor Ilya Musin, he subsequently attended the operatic and symphonic conducting classes of Yuri Temirkanov, graduating in summer 2001. In 2000, he gained the top award in the 3rd International Prokofiev Competition and thereafter became Chief Conductor of the State Symphony Orchestra of Russia and Artistic Director of the North Ossetian State Philharmonic Orchestra.  These posts continued until the 2002/03 season.

He made his full Kirov Opera debut in December 2001 with Il Viaggio a Reims, and returned in 2002 and 2003 for Eugene Onegin , with which he also made his Metropolitan Opera, New York, debut with the company in July 2003. In the 2005/6 season he conducted performances of The Golden Cockerel, Iolanta, Samson and Delilah and Onegin, and he performed his first new production with the company in Autumn 2004.

He started to receive international invitations while still a student and early seasons included Icelandic Opera (La bohème), Strasbourg Philharmonic Orchestra, Orchestra della Toscana, Orchestra of the Bayerische Staatsoper (a notably successful Rachmaninov Symphony No.2), BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, Strasbourg Philharmonic Orchestra, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre National de Montpellier and Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin.

In 2002 he made his UK debut conducting La bohème for Welsh National Opera, followed by a number of further productions, including a notable Onegin in Spring 2004. In 2002 he also made his acclaimed Philharmonia Orchestra debut with Rachmaninov Symphony No. 2 and now returns each season.

The 2003/4 season included return visits to Strasbourg and Montpellier, and he made very successful debuts with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, Frankfurt Radio Symphony and Orchestre National de Toulouse. He also made an acclaimed debut at the 2004 Aix-en-Provence Festival (Love of Three Oranges.

He conducted hugely successful revivals of this production for the Grand Théâtre de la Ville de Luxembourg in 2005 and at the Teatro Real, Madrid in Autumn 2006. Other highlights of the 2004/5 season included return visits to the Philharmonia, the Swedish Radio Orchestra and his debut with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra. In August 2005 he replaced Lorin Maazel at short notice with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and received outstanding reviews as well as an immediate re-invitation.

In 2005/6 he made debuts with Houston Grand Opera (Boris Godounov), Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Orchestre National de France, Oslo Philharmonic, Royal Concertgebouw, Frankfurt Radio Symphony and Munich Philharmonic. He also conducted highly acclaimed concerts during his first year as Principal Guest Conductor in Toulouse.

Last season included returns to Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre National de France, Bournemouth Symphony, Orchestra of the Bayerische Staatsoper and the Philharmonia. He also released his first recording with the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse on the Naïve label (Mussorgsky Pictures at an Exhibition and Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 4), which won outstanding reviews.

In 2007/8 he makes his debuts with Fondazione Arturo Toscanini, Orquesta Nacional de España, La Scala, Euskadi Orchestra and RAI Turin. He also returns to Finnish Radio, DSO Berlin, Bournemouth Symphony, Orchestre National de France and the Philharmonia, as well as his regular appearances with the Mariinsky Theatre and Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse.