Kent Nagano

Born in Berkeley, California, in 1951, Kent Nagano studied at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and San Francisco State University and gained practical experience at San Francisco Opera. He was appointed Music Director of the Berkeley Symphony Orchestra in 1978 and assisted Seiji Ozawa in the world premiere of Messiaen’s Saint François d’Assise in Paris in 1983. His international breakthrough came in 1984 with a performance of Mahler’s Ninth Symphony with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, for which he received the Seaver/National Endowment for the Arts Conductors Award. Nagano was appointed Music Director of the Opéra de Lyon in 1989 (until 1998). From 1991 to 2000, he was Music Director of the Hallé Orchestra and, from 2000 to 2006, Principal Conductor of the Deutsches Symphonie-­Orchester Berlin; from 2006 to 2020, he led the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal. His opera career has included major posts as General Music Director at the Bavarian Staatsoper (2006–13) and the Hamburg Staatsoper (2015–25). In September 2026, Nagano will become Principal Conductor and Artistic Director of the Orquesta y Coro Nacionales de España in Madrid. He has led many of the world’s leading orchestras and has appeared at the Metropolitan Opera, Los Angeles and San Francisco Opera, La Scala in Milan, and the Berlin Staatsoper. He conducted the world premiere of Kaija Saariaho’s L’Amour de loin at the Salzburg Festival and premiered Pascal Dusapin’s Il Viaggio, Dante at the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence; in the summer of 2026, he led the premiere of Sciarrino’s Venere e Adone at Teatro la Fenice in Venice. Nagano was named Honorary Conductor of Concerto Köln in 2019; with this ensemble and the Dresden Festival Orchestra, he leads the Dresden Music Festival’s historically informed period-instrument project The Wagner Cycles. His books include Classical Music: Expect the Unexpected (2014), a defense of classical music, and 10 Lessons of My Life (2021), a memoir about encounters that changed his life.

Lucerne Festival debut on 1 September 1998 leading the Hallé Orchestra and the Arnold Schönberg Choir in Messiaen’s Saint François d’Assise; last appearance here was on 12 September 2025 in Wagner’s Siegfried.

July 2026