Stefan Asbury

Conductor

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“The judicious and commanding baton of Stefan Asbury… [at the Leipzig Gewandhaus].”
(Leipziger Volkszeitung, February 2014)

A regular guest with leading orchestras worldwide, Stefan Asbury’s 2022/23 season starts with visits to the Chicago Center for Contemporary Composition, the Indianapolis and Tulsa Symphony orchestras, followed by engagements with the Norrköpings Symfoniorkester, Ensemble Modern, the National Symphony Orchestra of Taiwan and the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra.

Recent seasons saw Stefan returning to and debuting with several orchestras across the world, including the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester, Copenhagen Philharmonic, Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, Seattle and Vancouver Symphony orchestras, Ensemble Resonanz in Hamburg, Pacific Philharmonia Tokyo, Auckland Philharmonia and China National Symphony Orchestra. He conducted the MDR Sinfonieorchester Leipzig as part of Beethovenfest Bonn and Orquesta Sinfonica de Bilbao during Bilbao’s Musika-Musica 2019 festival.

Asbury has particularly strong relationships with many living composers including Steve Reich, Wolfgang Rihm, Unsuk Chin and Mark-Anthony Turnage. In 2015/16, he conducted the world premiere of Bernd Richard Deutsch’s Organ Concert at the Musikverein in Vienna. In the 2014/15 season he conducted the world premiere of Sir Harrison Birtwistle’s Piano Concerto with Pierre-Laurent Aimard and Sinfonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, and also gave the US premiere with Aimard and the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Following the sad passing of Oliver Knussen, a very close mentor, Stefan conducted his last completed composition with the Birmingham Contemporary Music Group in November 2018.

As a recording artist, Stefan’s album with works by Jonathan Harvey was awarded a Monde de la Musique CHOC award, and his complete cycle of Gerard Grisey’s Les Espaces Accoustiques with WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln won a Deutschen Schallplattenkritik award.

In October 2013 he conducted the world premiere of Michael Jarell’s Siegfried Nocturne at the Wagner Geneva Festival. Other opera highlights include Porgy and Bess at the Spoleto Festival, John Adams’ A Flowering Tree for the Perth International Arts Festival, Wolfgang Rihm’s Jakob Lenz for the Wiener Festwochen, Britten’s Owen Wingrave with Tapiola Sinfonietta and Knussen’s Where the Wild Things Are at Tanglewood. He also collaborated with Copenhagen Phil and the Danish Dance Theatre on a new production of The Firebird, the Mark Morris Dance Group in productions of Prokofiev’s Romeo and Juliet, and Virgil Thomson’s Four Saints in Three Acts with performances at the Lincoln Center in New York, London’s Barbican and the Brooklyn Academy of Music, amongst other venues.

Since 1995 Stefan Asbury has served on the faculty of the Tanglewood Music Center and has held the Sana H. Sabbagh Master Teacher Chair on the Conducting Faculty since 2005. In addition to his regular summer teaching he has given masterclasses at the Hochschule der Kunste (Zürich), Venice and Geneva Conservatoires, and with the Boston Symphony Orchestra’s Inside the TMC.

HarrisonParrott represents Stefan Asbury for worldwide general management.

Stefan Asbury - Ginastera: Popl Vuh (excerpt) © NEOS and WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln

Schreker: Kammersinfonie ∙ hr-Sinfonieorchester ∙ Stefan Asbury © Frankfurt Radio Symphony

Rota: Konzert für Streicher ∙ hr-Sinfonieorchester ∙ Stefan Asbury © Frankfurt Radio Symphony

Messiaen: Couleurs de la Cité céleste ∙ hr-Sinfonieorchester ∙ Pierre-Laurent Aimard ∙ Stefan Asbury © Frankfurt Radio Symphony

“[Messiaen’s Turangalîla-Symphonie] The Symphonie’s rhythms, structures, and harmonic relations are all incredibly complex and varied, but conductor Stefan Asbury and the APO never flagged during this spectacular concert… The fifth movement was a highlight and the orchestra flung itself into this dancing maelstrom with power and abandon… Stefan Asbury’s conducting led us through this thicket of themes and motifs with logic and coherence. The musicians captured all the extreme contrasts in the work from the pure and delicate to the fiery and brutal.”

(Peter Hoar, Radio New Zealand, March 2019)

“Such a piece (Grisey’s Les Espaces acoustiques) imperatively needs a conductor – Asbury doesn’t only show the diversity of the music but also sees the bigger picture. The Brit knows how to shape a breathing musical organism.”

(Muenchener Merkur, March 2018)

“Asbury conveys the captivatingly illustrative power of Shostakovich’s instrumentation with sheer cinematic imagination. The dreamy second movement shows the brutal conflicts with utmost severity.”

(Leipziger Volkszeitung, November 2017)

“Under Stefan Asbury’s baton, the young players (America’s finest) of the Spoleto Festival USA Orchestra find all the sophistication of Gershwin’s score.”

(Telegraph, May 2016)

“Asbury’s sovereignty guaranteed a vivid interpretation of Messiaen [at Staatsoper Hannover] which will stay in the audience’s memory for a long time.”

(Ludolf Baucke, Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung, May 2015)

“The judicious and commanding baton of Stefan Asbury… [at the Leipzig Gewandhaus].”

(Leipziger Volkszeitung, February 2014)

“The big surprise was that the new chief’s authority, he was able to show this convincingly in standard repertoire. The prelude and Liebestod from Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde was full of romantic mystery. With elegant tension proved the conductor that in silence the most beautiful music can hide. Asbury’s handling of parts from Prokofiev’s ballet Romeo and Juliet music was nothing less than a sensation. He seemingly effortlessly elicited transparency and bright colors out of the orchestra, and his honest approach won him in perfect drops of theater out of the score. We have seldom heard this orchestra play so well. After the concert, the musicians applauded for the new chief-conductor and everyone was there to shine… Groningen has something to discover…”

(De Telegraaf, December 2011)

“Stefan Asbury conducted with considerable attention to detail, skilfully guiding the performers through the music’s rhythmic complexities.”

(The Australian, March 2009)

“Outstanding: Stefan Asbury at the helm of the 11-strong ensemble from Klangforum Wien.”

(Die Welt, May 2008)