“From the second Sascha Goetzel took the stage… we knew we were in for a treat of a concert. He’s one of those magical conductors whose charisma connecting with every single member of the orchestra, pulling in the audience to come along with them for a ride.”
BBC Proms Behind the Scenes,
Alice Newton
Austrian conductor Sascha Goetzel has long established a remarkable reputation as both a principal conductor and a preferred guest conductor. Born in 1970 in Vienna, he received his first music lessons at the age of five from his father, who taught him violin, and at 11 he began studying conducting with Prof. Richard Österreicher.
Inspired by the art of Zubin Mehta, Maris Jansons and Seiji Ozawa, Ozawa became his teacher and invited him to the Tanglewood Festival, he then also studied with Jorma Panula and at the age of 24 began to lead the Austrian-Korean Philharmonic in Vienna. In 2008 he became Artistic Director and Principal Conductor of the Istanbul Borusan Philharmonic. With this orchestra, he performed at the Salzburg Festival (2010), made a brilliant debut at the BBC Proms (2014) and made his first major European tour (2017). As Artistic Director and Principal Conductor of the orchestra, he took it to a new, even higher artistic level and earned it international recognition with appearances at the Salzburg Music Festival (2010), BBC Proms (2014) , Hong Kong Arts Festival and European concert tours at the Musikverein and Concerthaus Vienna, Concertgebouw Amsterdam, Théâtre des Champs-Elysees Paris, among others. Maestro Goetzel has conducted the Kanagawa Philharmonic Orchestra, Japan; the Symphony Orchestras of Brittany and Kuopio, Finland; the Pacific Music Festival in Japan; and the Austrian-Korean Philharmonic Orchestra. He is the Artistic Director of the Turkish Music for Peace Foundation and works closely with young people in music education, development and performance.
As a guest conductor, he is frequently invited by the NHK Symphony Orchestra, Munich Philharmonic Orchestra, Lyric-Nancy Symphony Orchestra, Paris Chamber Orchestra, Orchestre National de Bordeaux, and Dresden Philharmonic Orchestra, National Orchestras of France and Belgium, the Orchestra of the Teatro Comunale – Bologna, the Israel Symphony Orchestra, the London Philharmonic Orchestra, the Luxembourg, Strasbourg and Vancouver Symphony Orchestras, the Abu Dhabi Music Festival.
Goetzel has worked with soloists including Daniil Trifonov, Beatrice Rana, Yuja Wang, Rudolf Buchbinder, Murray Perahia, Vadim Repin, Maxim Vengerov, Arcadi Volodos, Julian Rachlin, Daniel Hope, Placido Domingo, José Carreras, Anna Netrebko, Renee Fleming, Bryn Terfel, Piotr Beczala.
Goetzel is also highly regarded as an opera conductor and has appeared at the Wiener Staatsoper, Marrinsky Theatre, Zürich Opera, Wiener Volksoper, Opera Anger-Nantes,Opera de Montpelier, Tokyo Nikkikai Opera Company at Tokyo Bunka Kaikan, Tiroler Landestheater, Opera de Rennes, Opéra National de Lorraine à Nancy. His 2014 direction of Le Nozze di Figaro at Wiener Staatsoper garnered high praise and re-engagement to conduct six more operas- Don Giovanni, Die Zauberflöte, Rigoletto, Der Rosenkavalier. And in 2017, Sascha Goetzel conducted Cimarosa’s “The Secret Marriage” at the Lorrain National Opera in Nancy. He has conducted many famed singers in operas and concerts including Placido Domingo, José Carreras, Roberto Alagna, Thomas Hampson, Juan Diego Flores, Anna Netrebko, Renée Fleming, Joyce Di Donato and Michael Schade, among others.
He has released CDs on the Deutsche Grammophon and Onyx labels: “Sascha Goetzel conducts works by Respighi, Hindemith and Schmitt” (2010), “Music of the Machine Age” (2012), “Scheherazade” – Rimsky-Korsakov (2014), “Carmen” (2016), Tchaikovsky, Violin Concerto and Variations “Rococo” (2017) , Khachaturian, Violin Concerto (2018). Together with the Paris Chamber Orchestra, he has recorded music by Bach and Schnittke, and his three albums recorded with the Borusan Philharmonic Orchestra – Istanbul have each been awarded 5 stars for performance and sound by BBC Music Magazine.
Since the 2019-2020 season, Sascha Goetzel has been the Principal Guest Conductor of the Sofia Philharmonic.