Dennis Russell Davies

Dennis Russell Davies ( born April 16, 1944 in Toledo, Ohio, USA) is an American conductor and pianist.

At the Juilliard School of Music in New York, he studied piano with Lonny Epstein and Sascha Gorodnitski and conducting with Jean Morel and Jorge Mester; where he also received his doctorate. Together with Garrett List, he founded the Juilliard Ensemble. He is a renowned promoter of contemporary composers and modern music, such as Hans Werner Henze, William Bolcom, Lou Harrison, Alan Hovhaness, John Cage, Philip Glass, Giya Kancheli, Arvo Pärt, Virgil Thomson and Aaron Copland. He gave numerous works commissioned, conducted the premieres and took them on record. Noteworthy are Copland's Appalachian Spring with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra from 1979, for which he received a Grammy Award, Arvo Pärt's Fratres and Miserere and many of Philip Glass' operas and symphonies, including Symphony No. 5, which is dedicated to him. Lou Harrison's Symphony No. 3 is also dedicated to Davies.

Davies was Music Director of the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra ( 1972-80 ). Together with the composer Francis Thorne he founded in 1977 in New York, the American Composers Orchestra, which he led until 2002. From 1990 to 1996 he was Music Director of the Brooklyn Philharmonic.

In 1980 he moved to Stuttgart, where he was music director of the Württemberg State Opera ( 1980-1987 ). There he directed the premieres of operas Akhnaten and Satyagraha by Philip Glass and led standard operas often in innovative and unusual productions. He worked with many directors, including with Robert Altman for a performance of Salome in Hamburg. He also held positions with the Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, the " Orchestra of the Beethoven Hall in Bonn " (1987-1995) and the Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra. Since 2002 he has been chief conductor of the Bruckner Orchester Linz and the Linz Opera of the State Theatre; his contract runs until 2014. since 2010 he has also been chief conductor of the Symphony Orchestra Basel with a lease running until 2016.

Davies also launched numerous festival orchestras, such as the Aspen Music Festival, the Cabrillo Music Festival, the Saratoga Music Festival, and he conducted from 1978 to 1980 the Flying Dutchman at the Bayreuth Festival. He was frequently engaged as a guest conductor, such as the Philadelphia Orchestra and New York Philharmonic Orchestra. In Europe he works with the Munich Philharmonic, Berlin Philharmonic and the Accademia di Santa Cecilia in Rome. In 1998, he opened the Salzburg Festival with a new production of Kurt Weill's Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny.

Since 1997, Davies is professor of conducting at the Salzburg Mozarteum.