CONDUCTOR

Alexander Walker’s career has taken him all over the world. He is a regular guest conductor with the legendary Russian State Symphony Orchestra whom he has conducted in concerts at Moscow’s Tchaikovsky Hall, and International Performing Arts Centre.  Appearances during the last couple of seasons have included concerts with Prague Philharmonia in the Dvorak Hall of the Rudolfinum, as well as with the Belgrade Philharmonic, City of London Sinfonia, the Belgrade Strings (broadcasting on National Television with them last year), the Georges Enescu Philharmonic, Bucharest, the North Hungarian Symphony Orchestra, the Wroc?aw State Symphony Orchestra and the Russian Philharmonia.  Other engagements have included Gala Concerts at the Bridgewater Hall in Manchester with the Manchester Concert Orchestra and at the Barbican with the London Concert Orchestra for Raymond Gubbay Ltd.

He works regularly at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden, and has toured with the Royal Ballet to the Bolshoi and Mariinsky Theatres in Russia, throughout the USA including to the Metropolitan Opera and Kennedy Center, as well as to Singapore, Korea, Japan and Turkey.  He has conducted performances of The Nutcracker at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden and other work for the Royal Ballet has included Giselle, Manon, Romeo and Juliet and Swan Lake.  He also recently conducted a successful Gala performance with Anastasia Volochkova at Sadler’s Wells.

After completing a music degree at Bristol University and post-graduate studies at the Guildhall School of Music and Drama in London, Alexander Walker studied with Ilya Musin at St. Petersburg Conservatoire and has since performed throughout the former Soviet Union where many of his concerts have been broadcast on National television and radio.  He was Principal Guest Conductor of the Voronezh State Symphony Orchestra from 1999-2004.  He is a regular guest conductor with the Mikkeli and Lappeenranta City Orchestras in Finland, and of the Esbjerg Ensemble and the Vestyjsk Sinfonieorkester in Denmark.  He conducts regularly in Poland, his engagements including performances with the Kielce State Philharmonic, the Lower Silesian State Philharmonic Orchestras, the Lublin State Philharmonic, the Sudettan State Philharmonic, the Wroclaw Academy Orchestra and the Wroclaw State Philharmonic Orchestras. He also conducts a number of orchestras throughout the Balkans, Turkey and Romania.  In the UK, his engagements have included conducting the Covent Garden Chamber Orchestra, the London Philharmonic Youth Orchestra, the New Queens Hall Orchestra and the Russian Orchestra of London.

Proactive in presenting audiences with great music unfamiliar to them, he has organised festivals featuring the music of Nielson in Russia, Karlowicz in Finland and is particularly highly regarded for his interpretations of Middle and East European classical and 19th and 20th century repertoire at home.  An enthusiast for contemporary music, he has given first performances of music by Andrei Petrov, Aki-Yli Salomaki, Vladislav Uspenski, and many others.  His operatic repertoire includes the major operas of Verdi, Puccini and Mozart and Tchaikovsky as well as Tobias and the Angel, Carmen, A Life for the Tsar, Ariadne auf Naxos, A Life for the Tsar, and Gli Equivoci nel sembiante, for companies including the English Touring Opera, Oundle International Festival, Bampton Classical Opera, Chelsea Opera Group, European Chamber Opera, London City Opera and the Ukrainian National Opera in Odessa.  He recently conducted Tosca for the Cheboksary International Opera Festival with a cast including Nikolai Putilin and Virginia Kerr.

Engagements for 2008-9 include return visits to conduct the Izmir State Symphony Orchestra (Turkey), Wroclaw Philharmonic Orchestra (Poland) and to conduct a New Year’s Day concert with the Mikkeli City Orchestra (Finland) as well as a repeat invitation to conduct a Russian Christmas Gala at the Barbican Hall for Raymond Gubbay Ltd. and concerts with Cukerova Symphony Orchestra in Turkey. In the world of opera, he will conduct The Cunning Little Vixen at the Oundle Festival, Moniuszko’s Verbum Nobile at the Polish Centre, London and Rigoletto for the Chélyabinsk, Ekaterinburg and Perm State Opera Houses in Russia. He will also assist on Paradise Moscow for Opera North. He has been appointed Music Director of the Norfolk Symphony Orchestra from September 2008.

www.walkeralexander.co.uk

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