Conductor Juraj Valčuha is recognized for the effortless expressiveness and the depth of his musicianship. With a sharp baton technique and a natural stage presence, it is the impressive ease of his interpretations that translate even the most complex scores into immersive experiences.
Since June 2022 Valčuha is Music Director of the Houston Symphony. He was Music Director of the Teatro di San Carlo, Naples from 2016 to 2022 and First Guest Conductor of the Konzerthausorchester Berlin. He was Chief Conductor of the Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della Rai from 2009 to 2016.
2005/2006 marked the start of his international career on the podium of the Orchestre National de France followed by remarkable debuts in the U.K. with the Philharmonia London, in Germany with the Munich Philharmonic, in the U.S. with the Pittsburgh Symphony and in Italy with Puccini´s La Boheme in Bologna.
He has since led the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, Dresden Staatskapelle, Munich Philharmonic, Berlin Philharmonic, Swedish Radio Symphony, Amsterdam Royal Concertgebouw, Rotterdam Philharmonic, Orchestre de Paris, Maggio Musicale in Florence, Orchestra dell´Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia Rome and Milan´s Filarmonica della Scala, Montréal Symphony, NHK and Yomiuri orchestras Tokyo.
In the USA he enjoys regular collaborations with the Houston Symphony, Minnesota Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Pittsburgh Symphony and the San Francisco Symphony.
International touring with the Orchestra Sinfonica della Rai took them to the Musikverein in Vienna and Philharmonie in Berlin, Cologne, Düsseldorf, Zurich, Munich, to the Enesco Festival in Bucarest and the Abu Dhabi Classics. With the Konzerthausorchester Berlin he visited Riga, Vilnius and Tallinn, to mark the 100th anniversary of the Baltic nations.
In Europe he is acclaimed on the podium of the Munich Philharmonic, the NDR Hamburg and hr Frankfurt Radio orchestras, the Vienna Symphony, Czech Philharmonic, Orchestre National de France, Orchestre de Paris, BBC Symphony and Philharmonia London, the Orchestra dell´Accademia di Santa Cecilia in Rome, the Swedish Radio Orchestra.
Juraj Valcuha champions the compositions of living composers and is aiming to programm contemporary pieces in most of his concerts. With the Pittsburgh Symphony he premiered Christopher Rouses´s “Supplica”. With the BBC Symphony in Manchester he led the first performance of Steven Mackey´s violin concerto with Leila Josefowitz. At the Melos-Ethos Festival in Bratislava he conducted Steve Reich´s Four Sections in his presence. Some other composers he is interested in are Brice Dessner, Steven Stucky, Andrew Dorman, James MacMillan, Luca Francesconi, Anna Thorvaldsdottir, Anna Clyne, Jessie Montgomery, among others
His engagements in 2023 and 2024 take him to the Houston, Pittsburgh, San Francisco, Chicago and Minnesota Orchestras as well as to the Yomiuri Nippon Orchestra in Tokyo. On the European stage he performs Fanciulla del West and Tristan & Isolde at the Bavarian State Opera and at the Deutsche Oper Berlin, Jenufa at the Opera di Roma and Salomê at the Semperoper in Dresden. He leads concerts with the RAI Orchestra, the Orchestra dell´Accademia di Santa Cecilia, the Orchestre National de France, the NDR, SWR and Bamberg among others.
Born in Bratislava Slovakia, he studied composition and conducting in his birth place, then in St Petersburg (with Ilya Musin) as well as in Paris.
This biography is for reference and should not be reproduced. For editing please contact Anne Petkov +4179 4352547 or email annepetkov@bluewin.ch.