Lorenzo Viotti

In his new position as principal conductor of the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra and the Dutch National Opera (DNO), Lorenzo Viotti opened the 2021/22 season with Alexander von Zemlinsky’s Der Zwerg and Joseph Haydn’s Missa in tempore belli. He made his DNO debut in September 2019, replacing Sir Mark Elder in the double bill Pagliacci / Cavalleria rusticana. In addition to numerous concert projects, the new productions of Massenet’s Thaïs at Teatro alla Scala and Puccini’s Tosca at the DNO were among the highlights of the current season.

Viotti has already made a name for himself as both an opera and concert conductor. He has conducted numerous concerts ranging from classical to contemporary repertoire and opera titles such as Gounod’s Romeo et Juliette (La Scala, Milano), Manon Lescaut (Oper Frankfurt), Rigoletto (Staatsoper Stuttgart and Semperoper Dresden), Werther (Oper Frankfurt and Opernhaus Zürich), Tosca (Oper Frankfurt and New National Theatre Tokyo), Carmen (Staatsoper Hamburg and Opéra national de Paris), Die Csárdásfürstin (Opernhaus Zürich) and Faust (Opéra national de Paris, recording and TV broadcast).

Among the many distinguished orchestras Viotti has conducted so far are the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in Amsterdam, the  BBC Philharmonic in Manchester, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, Tokyo Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre National de France Paris, Bamberg Symphony Orchestra, Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, Munich Philharmonic Orchestra, Tonkünstler Orchestra, Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, Göteborgs Symfoniker, the Danish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, Camerata Salzburg, the ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra,  Wiener Symphoniker, Staatskapelle Dresden, Gustav Mahler Youth Orchestra, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra London, Filarmonica della Scala Orchestra, Staatskapelle  Berlin, Netherlands Philharmonic and the Gulbenkian Orchestra in Lisbon, which Voitti led as principal conductor for three years until the end of August 2021 and where he was able to attract new audiences also through special projects.

Lorenzo Viotti´s debuts in the USA with the Cleveland Orchestra and in Canada with the Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal have been highly acclaimed by audiences and critics alike.

He has also won several major conducting competitions, including the Nestlé Young Conductors Award at the 2015 Salzburg Festival, the 11th International Conducting Competition of the Orquestra de Cadaqués and the Conducting Competition at the MDR Symphony Orchestra. In 2017, he received the “Newcomer of the Year” award at the International Opera Awards in London.

Lorenzo Viotti was born in Lausanne into a Franco-Italian family of musicians. He studied piano, singing and percussion in Lyon and attended orchestral conducting courses with Professor Georg Mark in Vienna, where he simultaneously performed as a percussionist in various major orchestras, including the Vienna Philharmonic. He continued his conductor’s training with Nicolás Pasquet at the Franz Liszt Conservatory in Weimar.