MICHEL TABACHNIK has led the Brussels Philharmonic Orchestra with great success for many years, and remains conductor emeritus. Nowadays, he is invited by prestigious world ensembles such as the Radio-Sinfonieorchester Stuttgart, the orchestras of the Koncerthaus Berlin, Teatro La Fenice in Venice and the St. Petersburg Philharmonic, Budapest Festival Orchestra, RAI National Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre de Paris, Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana, at the Lucerne and Salzburg Festivals and since its’ inaugural season he has conducted three times at the New Philharmonie de Paris.
Having studied piano, composition and conducting in Geneva, Tabachnik was discovered by several famous conductors – Herbert von Karajan, who regularly invited him to conduct his Berlin Philharmonic, Igor Markevitch whom he assisted at the RTVE Orchestra Madrid and also from Pierre Boulez, with whom worked at the BBC Symphony Orchestra London. It was this collaboration and friendship that brought Tabachnik even closer to contemporary music and eminent composers such as Stockhausen, Berio, Ligeti and Messiaen. He has conducted more than 100 world premieres, among them at least 20 by Iannis Xenakis, who always regarded him as his “favorite performer”.
Tabachnik was Chief Conductor of the Gulbenkian Foundation Lisbon, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Lorraine and the Ensemble Intercontemporain Paris and the Noord Nederlands Orkest as Chief Conductor where he is currently Conductor Emeritus.
After his nomination as Chief Conductor of the Brussels Philharmonic in 2008 Tabachnik played a crucial role in shaping and developing the orchestra. He secured the orchestra a residency at the Cité de la Musique Paris for three consecutive seasons and took it to venues in Berlin, London, Vienna, Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Salzburg, international tours including Germany, the United Kingdom, France, Asia…
In the operatic field he has conducted in Paris, Geneva, Zurich, Copenhagen, Lisbon, Rome, Madrid, Montréal and at the Bolshoi. He was regularly invited by the Canadian opera company in Toronto, where he conducted e.g. Lohengrin, Madame Butterfly, Carmen and Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress.
Alongside his successful conducting activities Michel Tabachnik is also internationally recognized as a composer and author. Several of his works recently received their world premiere: Prélude à la légende (Prelude to the Legend) in Besançon, his violin concerto with Brussels Philharmonic, Livre de Job ( The book of Job) at the Cité de la musique Paris and finally Sumer in 2019, his cello concerto that was given its first performance by Gautier Capuçon. In March 2016 the Opéra de Lyon staged the world premiere of Tabachnik’s opera Benjamin – dernière nuit (Benjamin – last night) based on a libretto by Régis Debray.
His books De la musique avant toute chose (Music Before Anything Else) were published in 2008 and L’homme sauvage (The Wild Man) in 2013. He has written several novels, the most recent being L’enlèvement au Sinaï (Abduction in Sinai). Ma Rhapsodie (My Rhapsody), his essays on music and his life, was published by Buchet-Chastel in 2016.
Tabachnik is a respected pedagogue and has given numerous Masterclasses, e.g. in Hilversum, Lisbon (the Gulbenkian Foundation), Paris, Brussels and Stockholm conservatories. He has held the position of Professor of Conducting at both the Faculty of Music, University of Toronto, and the Royal Academy of Music in Copenhagen.
His discography (Erato and Lyrinx) reflects the versatility of his repertoire, which ranges from Beethoven, Bruckner and Wagner to Honegger, Xenakis and Boulez. The French-speaking Swiss Radio’s international jury voted his recording of Schumann’s Piano Concerto (with Catherine Collard) “best performance of this work”. His recording of Stravinsky’s Sacre du Printemps (2013) received a Gramophone Award, and the recording of Claude Debussy’s La Mer was ranked as a reference recording “number 1” by both Classica magazine and Radio France.