Pedro Halffter

Pedro Halffter Cato (born Madrid, 1971) is a Spanish conductor and composer. He is artistic director of the Royal Seville Symphony Orchestra, music director of the Teatro de la Maestranza (Seville) and Music Director of the Orquesta Filarmónica de Gran Canaria in Las Palmas.

Born in Madrid, as the son of composer Cristóbal Halffter, he went to boarding school in Germany at the Schule Schloss Salem. After completing his German Abitur he studied conducting at the Hochschule für Musik in Vienna, receiving a degree in 1995. He has been the recipient of the Jugend musiziert Prize, Young Composers Prize of the Deutscher Musikrat (German Music Council, a member of the International Music Council), Young Conductors Prize of the European Union, as well as grants from the Juventudes de Madrid and the Banco de España, and a Fulbright scholarship for composition studies in New York.