Biography
The 29-year-old conductor Alexander Prior, designated Music Director of the Erfurt Theater and Chief Conductor of the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra, can already look back on an extensive opera and concert career. He works with orchestras and opera houses throughout the world including San Francisco, Detroit, Seattle and Houston symphony orchestras and The Queensland Symphony Orchestra. Further collaborations have been with Orquesta Sinfónica de Madrid, NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester, Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, Camerata Salzburg, Vienna Chamber Orchestra, Norwegian Radio Orchestra and Aarhus Symphony Orchestra to just mention a few.
Alexander Prior has led productions at Bayerische Staatsoper (Mirandolina), Leipzig Opera with Gewandhausorchester (La traviata), Royal Danish Opera in Copenhagen (Carmen), at Tiroler Festspiele in Erl (Rusalka), at Vancouver Opera (Hansel and Gretel) and at Edmonton Opera (Elektra) amongst others. With Frankfurt Opera he has a special relationship: his very successful debut in 2017/18 with Verdi’s Rigoletto resulted in an immediate reinvitation to conduct Martinů’s Julietta and a symphonic concert in 2019. The performances in Frankfurt of Wagner’s Flying Dutchman in 2021 were cancelled due to the COVID19 pandemic.
After his debut at Staatstheater Braunschweig he was invited back to conduct a new Rigoletto production in 2015/16. In honor of his excellent artistic work the orchestra awarded Alexander Prior the ‘Louis-Spohr-Medal’.
In addition, Alexander Prior has gained international recognition for his compositions: His work Horizons: An American Crescendo for four soloists and orchestra premiered with Royal Philharmonic Orchestra at Barbican Centre. His ballet Mowgli, commissioned by the Russian State Ballet, was performed for the first time in 2008 at the Kremlin Theatre in Moscow and it has been continuously running since then. In summer 2020 his opera Swan Song will be published, also his orchestral version of Schubert’s Winterreise – performed by John Brancy – was celebrated by critics all over the world.
By the age of 13 Alexander Prior enrolled in St. Petersburg Conservatory to study conducting with Alexander Alexeev and composition with Boris Tishchenko. He graduated with honors when he was only 17 years old. Alexander Prior was Assistant Conductor at Seattle Symphony Orchestra and has been invited to the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s Tanglewood Music Centre and Aspen Music Festival. Important influences throughout his career have been Michael Tilson Thomas, Robert Spano, Thomas Dausgaard and Andrew Manze.