Bertrand de Billy

Bertrand de Billy with the Vienna Symphony Orchestra , Festival of Joy 2013

Bertrand de Billy (born January 11, 1965 in Paris ) is a French conductor .

Life

Bertrand de Billy was born in Paris, where he received his training and worked first as an orchestral musician, but very soon also as a conductor with various orchestras in his hometown, before he decided to go to Germany to work his way as an opera conductor from scratch work out. He started out as first conductor and managing general music director in Dessau .

He then had engagements in Berlin and Vienna, where he first drew attention to himself in 1994 with the premiere of Carmen at the Vienna Volksoper . From 1996 to 1998 he was the first conductor of the Vienna Volksoper, where he stood out with his interpretations of Mozart, but also with his musical implementation of the Harry Kupfer production by Boris Godunow .

At the same time, his international career developed very quickly. He appeared at the State Operas in Berlin , Hamburg and Munich , and from 1996 at the Vienna State Opera , at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden , at Brussels' La Monnaie and at the Paris Opéra National . He had further engagements in Washington , Los Angeles and at the New York Metropolitan Opera , where he has been a regular guest since 1997 and directed the new production of Gounod's Roméo et Juliette .

From autumn 1999 to July 2004, Bertrand de Billy was chief conductor of the rebuilt Teatro del Liceu in Barcelona . During this time he directed a total of 16 premieres, most recently Wagner's Ring des Nibelungen . In 2004 he studied the five-act version of Verdi's Don Carlos at the Vienna State Opera , and in 2007 he directed the premiere of Massenet's Manon with Anna Netrebko and Roberto Alagna . In 2008 he conducted the new production of Gounod's Faust .

Bertrand de Billy was chief conductor of the RSO Vienna from 2002 to 2010 . The cooperation with the RSO Vienna began in spring 1998 with Massenets Maria Magdalena at the OsterKlang festival and then continued at the KlangBogen summer festival with the productions Werther , Luisa Miller , Idomeneo , Fidelio and the project “Verdi-Marathon”. In the summer of 2006, the new production of Don Giovanni followed for the “Mozart Year” and almost parallel the Don Juan paraphrase Flammen by the Czech composer Erwin Schulhoff .

In summer 2008 he conducted the new production of Mozart's Don Giovanni with the Vienna Philharmonic at the Salzburg Festival . In October 2008 the new production of Gounod's Faust followed at the Vienna State Opera . In January 2009 he was at the podium of the RSO in the new production of Debussy's Pelléas et Mélisande in the Theater an der Wien. Also in 2009 he was awarded the Vienna Flute Clock for his recording of Mozart's three Da Ponte operas . He has been permanent guest conductor at the Frankfurt Opera since September 2013 and guest conductor of the Frankfurt Opera and Museum Orchestra (until 2018). From September 2013 to 2016 he was also principal guest conductor with the Orchester de Chambre de Lausanne .

In the concert sector, de Billy worked with the RSO Vienna on a large number of world premieres by contemporary composers - a. a. by Friedrich Cerha , György Kurtág , Thomas Daniel Schlee , Michael Jarrell , Henri Dutilleux , HK Gruber , Wolfgang Rihm , Johannes Maria Staud , Benoît Mernier , Fausto Romitelli , Jörg Widmann , Luciano Berio , BA Zimmermann , Olivier Messiaen and Hans Werner Henze . In addition, he began a Mahler cycle and placed classics of the 20th century (Debussy, Ravel , Alban Berg , de Falla , Hindemith, etc.) alongside the continuous cultivation of the classical and romantic. Since 2002, Bertrand de Billy has performed with the RSO Vienna every year at the Salzburg Festival.

Recorded productions

Bertrand de Billy has recorded numerous CD productions with the Vienna RSO, including a Mozart / da Ponte cycle, Eugen d'Albert's lowland , excerpts from Wagner's Tristan and Isolde (with Deborah Polaski and Johan Botha ), piano concertos by Ravel and George Gershwin with Pascal Rogé and Schubert's Great Symphony in C major . This was followed by a recording of Beethoven's Eroica . In spring 2008 a recording of Paul Dukas ' Ariane et Barbe-Bleue with Deborah Polaski was released, as well as other Beethoven symphonies and tone poems by Richard Strauss .

Awards

He is a knight of the French Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur , the Ordre national du Mérite and Ordre des Arts et des Lettres . In 2010 he received the Golden Decoration for Services to the Republic of Austria . Bertrand de Billy is also on the board of the European Music Theater Academy . In 2014 he was awarded the Golden Schikaneder in the category best musical direction for Mathis der Maler at the Theater an der Wien at the Austrian Music Theater Prize.

Web links

Individual evidence

↑ Awarding of the 2nd Austrian Music Theater Prize on June 17, 2014 . Retrieved April 4, 2015.

personal data
SURNAME	Billy, Bertrand de
BRIEF DESCRIPTION	French conductor
DATE OF BIRTH	January 11, 1965
PLACE OF BIRTH	Paris

[1] Awarding of the 2nd Austrian Music Theater Prize on June 17, 2014 . Retrieved April 4, 2015.