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Scott Lawton (born 1960 in New Castle, Pennsylvania) is an American conductor based in Germany.
Lawton has served as the Principal Conductor of the Deutsches Filmorchester Babelsberg in Potsdam since 1999. His activities with the Filmorchester include performances of silent films, studio recordings for film and television productions and orchestral concerts. Since 2005 he has served as conductor of the Landespolizeiorchester Nordrhein-Westfalen, a professional symphonic wind orchestra based in Wuppertal. From 2004 to 2009 he also served as music director of the summer festival in Bad Gandersheim.
During his high school years, Lawton attended programs of the Pennsylvania Governor's School for the Arts and the summer program of the Berklee School of Music. His university studies led to degrees from the Oberlin Conservatory and the University of Cincinnati. For several summers in the mid-80s, he conducted at the Ohio Light Opera, assisting James Paul with Gilbert and Sullivan and other productions and recordings. Following his Cincinnati studies, he worked with Vincent Persichetti in preparing the world premiere in Philadelphia of the opera "The Sibyl". During a subsequent year of graduate studies at the Louisiana State University, he assisted opera singer Martina Arroyo as she began her teaching career.
Prior to working with the Filmorchester in the late '90s he was staff conductor at the opera houses in Saarbrücken, Bielefeld and Trier. He also led major musical productions of The Phantom of the Opera , Les Misérables and 42nd Street in Vienna, Miss Saigon in Stuttgart, Cyrano in Amsterdam and Chicago in Berlin, Munich, Basel and Düsseldorf. At the Wiener Kammeroper he conducted productions of The Marriage of Figaro and Rigoletto . He conducted in 2007 a new production of Les Misérables for the opera house in Meiningen, Germany.
An advocate of genre-crossing symphonic projects, he has worked closely together with Omara Portuondo and the Buena Vista Social Club, Udo Lindenberg, Karat, Jon Lord and Joy Denalane. With Scorpions' "Moment of Glory" symphonic program he has toured Russia and the Baltic countries. In 2005 he led a tour of symphonic film music with UFA film star Johannes Heesters. He has conducted the annual televised José Carreras Benefit Gala in Leipzig since 2000. A series of crossover concerts in Potsdam's Nikolaisaal recently featured projects with the Motion Trio, Mísia, Besh O Drom and Mousse T. He led the final concert of the 2007 Potsdam Sanssouci Music Festival, which was subsequently broadcast on 3sat throughout Europe.
As a guest conductor he has led the Kölner Rundfunkorchester, Gürzenich Orchestra Köln, Wuppertal Sinfonie Orchester, Saarländisches Staatsorchester, the Meininger Hofkapelle, the Orchester of the Ludwigsburger Schlossfestspiele and the Brandenburgisches Staatsorchester.
He has led premiere performances of orchestral works by Franz Waxman (reconstruction of the original music to the film "Liliom"), Sir Malcolm Arnold ("Ballade for Piano and Orchestra" from "Stolen Face") und Ashley Irwin (new live soundtrack to Hitchcock's "The Lodger").
He has composed the music for several productions at the summer festival in Bad Gandersheim: 1) "Mozart in Manhattan", a chamber opera about Mozart's librettist Lorenzo da Ponte after he became a resident of New York City, 2) "Wenn Ärzte lieben", a musical theater parody of the Romance novel in a medical milieu, and 3) incidental music to a new productions of Astrid Lindgren's Emil i Lönneberga and L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.
Sir Alan Charles MacLaurin Mackerras was an Australian conductor. He was an authority on the operas of Janáček and Mozart, and the comic operas of Gilbert and Sullivan. He was long associated with the English National Opera and Welsh National Opera and was the first Australian chief conductor of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. He also specialized in Czech music as a whole, producing many recordings for the Czech label Supraphon.
Gianluigi Gelmetti OMRI, was an Italian-Monégasque conductor and composer.
Hans Graf is an Austrian conductor.
The German Film Orchestra Babelsberg is a symphony orchestra and music studio based in Potsdam, Germany.
Roberto Abbado is an Italian opera and symphonic music conductor. Currently he is Artistic Partner of The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra. In 2015 he has been appointed music director of Palau de les Arts Reina Sofia in Valencia, Spain. From 2018 he's Music Director of the Festival Verdi in Parma. Previously he held the position of Chief Conductor of Münchner Rundfunkorchester.
Daniel Meyer was born in Cleveland, Ohio and has been conductor and musical director of several prominent American orchestras.
Bernd Ruf is a German conductor and clarinettist. In 2004, Ruf was appointed a new professorship in popular music, jazz, and world music at the Lübeck University of Music.
Benjamin Shwartz is an American-Israeli orchestral and opera conductor, and music director of the Wrocław Philharmonic known for his interest in and commitment to new music. Born in Los Angeles and raised there and in Israel, he attended the Idyllwild Arts Academy in California before enrolling in the University of Pennsylvania, where he studied composition with James Primosch. He continued his composition studies in Germany with Karlheinz Stockhausen. As a conducting student at the Curtis Institute of Music, he studied with Otto-Werner Mueller and worked closely with Christoph Eschenbach and Ned Rorem. Shwartz won numerous awards including the Presser Award, and Third Prize in the 2007 International Mahler Conducting Competition in Bamberg, Germany. Since 2022 he ist music director of the Staatsorchester Rheinische Philharmonie, Koblenz (Germany).
The Philharmonisches Staatsorchester Mainz, is the resident orchestra of the Staatstheater Mainz. In addition to musical theater and Tanztheater youth symphony and chamber concerts are part of the activity of the orchestra. It is one of the three symphony orchestras of Rhineland-Palatinate. Since September 2011, Hermann Bäumer has been principal conductor.
The Biel Solothurn Symphony Orchestra was founded in 1969 and has since gained an important place within the Swiss music scene. It is based in the Swiss cities of Biel-Bienne and Solothurn. Heavily influenced by Swiss conductors Armin Jordan and Jost Meier in its beginnings, the orchestra has been directed by Kaspar Zehnder since the 2012/2013 season.
Huan Jing is the resident conductor of Guangzhou Symphony Orchestra, and the musical director of Guangzhou Symphony Youth Orchestra. She graduated from the Conducting Department of the Central Conservatory of Music, trained under the tutelage of Professor Xu Xin. In 2009, she obtained her master's degree in Orchestral Conducting at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music (CCM), where she was awarded a full scholarship to continue her doctoral studies. She served as the conducting assistant of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra and May Festival (2011–2013); she was also the conducting assistant of the Cincinnati Symphony Youth Orchestra (2011–2013) and principal guest conductor of the Artaria Chamber Orchestra.
Christopher Ward is a British conductor. In August 2018 he became the music director of Theater Aachen.
Kieth Engen was an American operatic bass who was a member of Munich's Bavarian State Opera for decades. Although his career was based in Munich, he appeared internationally as a guest singer at major opera houses and festivals and performed and recorded many of Bach's Passion oratorios and cantatas, primarily with the conductor Karl Richter. He was born Keith Sheldon Engen in Frazee, Minnesota, and died in Murnau am Staffelsee, Germany at the age of 79. He was given the title of Kammersänger in 1962 and was a recipient of the Bavarian Order of Merit. In the mid-1950s he also had a brief parallel career as a pop singer under the pseudonym Stan Oliver.
Walter Schartner was a German conductor, composer and Hochschullehrer. In 1946, he was appointed Generalmusikdirektor in Halle and as such he directed the Orchestra of the Halle Opera House. In 1949/50, he was chief conductor of the Philharmonisches Staatsorchester Halle.
Michael Helmrath is a German oboist and conductor and since the 2016/2017 season, active as General Music Director of the Theater Nordhausen/Loh-Orchester Sondershausen.
Christian Kluttig is a German conductor, pianist and Hochschullehrer. From 1979 to 1990, he was chief conductor of the Orchester des Opernhauses Halle. Appointed General Music Director in 1983, he worked as such at the theatres in Halle (Saale) and Theater Koblenz. The Handel interpreter rendered special services to the implementation of Historically informed performance in the Saale city, which made him one of the most important protagonists in this field in the GDR. He also devoted himself to Neue Musik, premiering Reiner Bredemeyer's opera Candide.
The Philharmonische Staatsorchester Halle was a symphony orchestra in Halle that existed from 1946 to 2006, which functioned as a concert orchestra and was last predominantly supported by the Land of Saxony-Anhalt. As a result of the fusion with the Orchester des Opernhauses Halle, the Orchestra was merged into the Staatskapelle Halle in 2006.
Thomas Rösner is an Austrian conductor.
Friedrich Haider is an Austrian conductor and pianist.
Garrett Keast is an American conductor of opera, orchestra, ballet, and chamber music and founder of the Berlin Academy of American Music (BAAM).