Yannick Nézet-Séguin
Chef d’orchestre
In October 2010, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, music director of the Metropolitan Opera in New York, made his debut conducting the Berliner Philharmoniker to great acclaim from press and public alike. Since then, the French-Canadian has been a regular guest of the orchestra.
Yannick Nézet-Séguin studied piano, conducting, composition and chamber music at the Conservatoire de musique du Québec and choral conducting at Westminster Choir College in Princeton. At the age of 19, he met Carlo Maria Giulini, who became his key musical mentor. Since 2000, Yannick Nézet-Séguin has been artistic director and principal conductor of the Orchestre Métropolitain in Montreal. For ten years, he also led the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, which later appointed him honorary conductor, before taking up the same position with the Philadelphia Orchestra. In Europe, Nézet-Séguin appears with leading orchestras such as the Vienna Philharmonic, the Staatskapelle Dresden, the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, the Chamber Orchestra of Europe (which also appointed him honorary conductor) and the London Philharmonic Orchestra, where he was principal guest conductor from 2008 to 2014. Opera engagements have taken him to Wiener Staatsoper, the Teatro alla Scala in Milan, the Royal Opera House in London and Dutch National Opera, and to the Salzburg Festival. Yannick Nézet-Séguin has received numerous awards, including the Royal Philharmonic Society Award and the National Arts Centre Award from the Canadian government. He has received honorary doctorates from several universities, including Montreal and Philadelphia.
