Eckehard Stier - Conductor
Eckehard Stier is Music Director and Chief Conductor of the Auckland Philharmonia Orchestra and Music Director of the opera house in Görlitz and Chief Conductor of the New Lausitz Philharmonic Orchestra. With a repertoire of 60 stage works and twice as many symphonic works, Eckehard Stier belongs to the leading German conductors of the younger generation.
In April 2006 he made a most successful Australian debut with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra conducting Bruckner's 9th Symphony. In spring 2007 and again in spring 2008, Eckehard Stier conducted the Auckland Phiharmonia in New Zealand. In August 2007 he took over on short notice a gala concert of the Munich Symphony within the prestigious Rheingau Musik Festival. Turn of the year 2007/08, he made his debut with the Dresden Philharmonic for a series of 4 concerts which was subsequently followed by his debut with the WDR Radio Orchestra, Cologne. Guest engagements in the 2008/09 season have seen his Finnish debut with the Joensuu City Orchestra and his Danish debut with the Odense Symphony Orchestra. He has since returned to the Staatskapelle Halle and to the WDR Radio Orchestra.
He has conducted the Staatskapelle Dresden, MDR Radio Symphony Orchestra Leipzig, Staatskapelle Halle and Chemnitz's Robert Schumann Philharmonic Orchestra. He has a continuing co-operation with the Dresdner Sinfoniker, a project-orchestra with musicians from many of the best German orchestras playing concerts of mostly contemporary music. With this orchestra he made the German premiere of Theo Loevendie's Johnny and Jones at the famous Musikfestspiele Dresden and he performed four early operas of Mikis Theodorakis on the occasion of his 80th birthday at the Athens Festival.
Today's musical personality of Eckehard Stier is the logical consequence of a lifetime of experience, beginning with his musical career as a boy soprano and section leader in the world renowned Dresdner Kreuz Choir with which he was the first winner of the Rudolf Mauersberger scholarship in 1991. At the age of 14 he had his first conducting lessons with Prof. Volker Rohde in Dresden and he became conductor of the Kreuzchor boarding school's orchestra. As a student of Prof. Siegfried Kurz at the Carl Maria von Weber Conservatory in Dresden, he became conductor of the Conservatory Orchestra and received a scholarship from the Richard Wagner Society. At this time he conducted the world premiere of The White Princess by Johannes Wulf Woesten and performed opera productions of Salieri's Prima la musica, poi le parole and Mozart's Cosi fan tutte in Germany and Switzerland. During his studies he was assistant to Hartmut Haenchen for Wagner's Parsifal at the Nederlands Opera Amsterdam and attended masterclasses with Sir Colin Davis, David Epstein and Mario Venzago.
In 1995, at the age of 23, he became staff conductor at the Opera of Chemnitz with a wide repertoire of opera and ballet productions in following years. During this time he was also assistant of Oleg Caetani for Tchaikovsky's Pique Dame at Stuttgart Opera, The Maid of Orleans at the Opera Nationale du Rhin in Strasbourg and for the production of Wagner's Ring at the Chemnitz Opera. In addition, he was invited as guest-conductor for works such as La Bohéme, Fidelio and Tchaikovsky`s The Maid of Orleans at the Komische Opera Berlin, Nürnberg Opera, State Opera of Hannover and at Strasbourg Opera.
Following his great success in a new production of Wagner's The Flying Dutchman in Görlitz he was appointed Chief Conductor of the New Lausitz Philharmonic Orchestra and Music Director of the Görlitz Opera in 2003.
In addition to his conducting activities in all areas of classical music, Eckehard Stier's enormous affinity for jazz has led to successful collaborations elsewhere, including conducting the German premiere of Howard Brubeck's Dialogues for Jazz-Combo and Orchestra in Dessau. As a pianist he recorded a CD of jazz ballads with saxophonist Ive Kanew.
May 2009