Tugan Sokhiev is rapidly establishing an international reputation, and is in demand from opera houses and orchestras worldwide. He has a close association with the Mariinsky Theatre, appears as guest conductor with a number of international orchestras and at the beginning of the current season he became Principal Guest Conductor and Artistic Adviser of the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse.
Sokhiev was born in Vladikavkaz, North Osetia in 1977 and studied at the St Petersburg State Conservatory. A pupil of the late Professor Ilya Musin, he subsequently attended the operatic and symphonic conducting classes of Yuri Temirkanov, graduating in summer 2001. In 2000, he gained the top award in the 3rd International Prokofiev Competition and thereafter became Chief Conductor of the State Symphony Orchestra of Russia and Artistic Director of the North Ossetian State Philharmonic Orchestra. These posts continued until the 2002/03 season.
He made his full Kirov Opera debut in December 2001 with Il Viaggio a Reims, and returned in 2002 and 2003 for Eugene Onegin , with which he also made his Metropolitan Opera, New York, debut with the company in July 2003. Last season he conducted performances of The Golden Cockerel, Iolanta, Samson and Delilah and Onegin, and he performed his first new production with the company in Autumn 2004. In 2002 he made his UK debut conducting La bohème for Welsh National Opera, followed by a number of further productions, including a notable Onegin in Spring 2004.
The 2000/2001 season included a highly-successful debut with Icelandic Opera (La bohème) and first visits to the Danish Radio Sinfonietta, Strasbourg Philharmonic Orchestra and Orchestra della Toscana. The following season included concerts with the Orchestra of the Bayerische Staatsoper (a notably successful Rachmaninov Symphony No.2) and BBC Philharmonic Orchestra and he returned to work with Orchestra della Toscana and Strasbourg Philharmonic Orchestra. He also made his debuts with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre National de Montpellier and Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin.
In August 2002 he made an acclaimed Philharmonia Orchestra debut with Rachmaninov Symphony No. 2, and returned for performances in the UK in October 2002 (which included his Royal Festival Hall debut) and April 2003. In November 2003 he received excellent reviews for his performances of Rachmaninov´s First and Third Piano Concertos with Mikhail Pletnev, and returned in October 2004 to conduct two more highly successful programmes at the Royal Festival Hall.
The 2003/4 season included return visits to Strasbourg and Montpellier, and he made very successful debuts with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Nuremberg Opera, Austrian Radio Orchestra, Frankfurt Radio Symphony and Orchestre National de Toulouse. His acclaimed debut at the 2004 Aix-en-Provence Festival (Love of Three Oranges) received excellent reviews.
He repeated this success with the same production at the Grand Théâtre de la Ville de Luxembourg in 2005 and will also take the production to Madrid in 2006. Other highlights of the 2004/5 season included return visits to the Philharmonia, the Swedish Radio Orchestra and debuts with the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra and the Orquestra Nacional do Porto at the Casa da Música. In August 2005 he stepped in at short notice to conduct concerts with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, for which he received outstanding reviews and an immediate re-invitation.
Plans for the current season include his first visits to Royal Concertgebouw, Houston Grand Opera, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Munich Philharmonic, Oslo Philharmonic and Orchestre National de France, regular appearances at the Mariinsky Theatre and return visits to many of the above orchestras.
