Born into an artistic Swiss family, Philippe Jordan has performed at all the world’s major opera houses, festivals and orchestras, and he is regarded as one of the most established and important conductors of his time.
He has been music director of the Vienna State Opera since September 2020 and opened his first season with new productions of Madama Butterfly, Parsifal and Macbeth, alongside revivals of Der Rosenkavalier and Le nozze di Figaro. In 2021-22, new productions of Don Giovanni, Wozzek and Tristan und Isolde followed. In the current season, he conducts the premieres of Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Salome and Le nozze di Figaro and revivals of Don Giovanni, Der Rosenkavalier, Tristan und Isolde, Wozzek and Parsifal.
Guest appearances this season will take him to the Orchestre National France, Munich Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony and Teatro del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino. He can be seen with the Vienna Philharmonic in symphonic concerts at the Konzerthaus Wien in the spring.
Jordan’s career on the podium began as Kapellmeister at Germany’s Stadttheater Ulm and at the Staatsoper Unter den Linden in Berlin. In 2001-2004, he was principal conductor of the Graz Opera and the Graz Philharmonic Orchestra, during which period he also debuted at several of the world’s leading opera houses and festivals, including at New York’s Metropolitan Opera, the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, the Teatro alla Scala, the Bavarian State Opera, Vienna State Opera, the Festspielhaus Baden-Baden and the festivals of Aix-en-Provence, Glyndebourne and Salzburg. In2006-2010, he returned to the Berlin State Opera as principal guest conductor. In the summer of 2012, he debuted at the Bayreuth Festival with Parsifal, returning again in 2017 with Bayreuth’s new production of Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, which he also conducted in subsequent years.
Jordan was musical director of the Opéra National de Paris between 2009 and 2021, where he conducted many premieres and revivals, including Moses und Aron, La damnation de Faust, Der Rosenkavalier, Samson et Dalila, Lohengrin, Don Carlos (in French), Les Troyens, Don Giovanni, a new production of Borodin’s Prince Igor and Wagner’s Ring cycle in a concert version.
During 2014-2020, Jordan served as principal conductor of the Vienna Symphony. Highlights of this tenure include complete cycles of Schubert’s symphonies and Beethoven’s symphonies and piano concertos, a cycle of J.S. Bach’s major masses and oratorios, Bruckner’s last three symphonies and modern classics by Kurtág, Ligeti and Scelsi.
As a conductor, Jordan has worked with the world’s most famous orchestras, including the Berlin, Vienna and Münich philharmonics, Vienna Symphony, London Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, Tonhalle Orchester Zürich, Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Gustav Mahler Jugendorchester, Israel Philharmonic Orchestra and the symphony orchestras of Boston, Seattle, St. Louis, Dallas, Detroit, Chicago, Cleveland, Philadelphia, Washington, Minnesota, Montreal, Los Angeles, New York and San Francisco.
2022-23
Please note: Biographies are based on information provided to the CSO by the artists or their representatives. More current information may be available on websites of the artists or their management.
