Elena Schwarz

The Swiss-Australian conductor Elena Schwarz has swiftly established a reputation for her musical vision, her versatility and her profound interpretations. In addition to regular invitations to work with orchestras such as the WDR Symphony Orchestra and the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, her 2022/23 season engagements included return invitations to work with the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, the Irish National Symphony Orchestra and the South Netherlands Philharmonic.

Other highlights this season included her debuts with the Philharmonia Orchestra, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, the Bremen Philharmonic, the Orchestre Royal de Liège, the Orchestre National de Lille, the Deutsche Staatsphilharmonie Rheinland-Pfalz, the San Diego Symphony and the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra.

Elena Schwarz has also collaborated with orchestras such as the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Norwegian Radio Orchestra, the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, the Orchestre de chambre de Paris, the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne, the Orquestra Gulbenkian and the Orquestra Sinfónica do Porto Casa da Música.

She has a particular affinity with contemporary music, has conducted world premieres by Peter Eötvös and Georges Aperghis, and works regularly with the best specialist ensembles such as the Ensemble Modern, the MusikFabrik NÖ, Klangforum Wien, the Ensemble intercontemporain and the Lucerne Festival Contemporary Orchestra, conducting works by George Benjamin, Thomas Adès, Arnulf Herrmann, Olga Neuwirth, Lisa Streich and Francesco Filidei among others.

Her opera work includes critically acclaimed productions for the Norwegian National Opera (Hänsel und Gretel), the Opéra national de Lyon (Peer Gynt) and at the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence (Adam Maor’s The Sleeping Thousand), along with Káťa Kabanová for the Opéra de Lyon; future projects include Rusalka at the Opéra de Nice.

Elena Schwarz won first prize at the Princess Astrid International Competition (Trondheim, 2014) and second prize at the Jorma Panula Conducting Competition (Vaasa, 2015). In the 2018/19 season she was the ‘Dudamel Fellow’ with the Los Angeles Philharmonic. She studied at the Haute École de Musique de Genève in Laurent Gay’s class and at the Conservatorio della Svizzera Italiana with Arturo Tamayo, and has taken part in masterclasses with Peter Eötvös, Bernard Haitink, Matthias Pintscher and Neeme Järvi. She was Mikko Franck’s assistant at the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, and assisted Asher Fisch at the West Australian Symphony Orchestra, and Marko Letonja at the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra, with which ensemble she appeared regularly as associate conductor from 2019 to 2021.