Conductor Steven Sloane is a versatile visionary. His extraordinary creative concepts have won him authority and respect both in artistic circles and in the realm of cultural politics.
Sloane, a former student of Eugene Ormandy, Franco Ferrara and Gary Bertini, is currently head conductor of two symphonic orchestras in Europe. As Music Director of the Bochumer Symphoniker, where he has been General Music Director since 1994, he has transformed the ensemble over the past 15 years into a leading German orchestra, known especially for adventurous and stunningly innovative programming. His work has been honored with awards and prizes, and unique in Germany, considerable private financial support, an unusual occurrence in a system dependant primarily on public sponsorship, which will allow the Bochumer Symphoniker to begin construction of a new concert hall in 2009.
Concurrently, since the 2007-2008 season Mr. Sloane has also been chief conductor of the Stavanger Symphony Orchestra (Norway). The beginning of his tenure there coincided with the city’s appointment as the 2008 European Capital of Culture, and the orchestra saw a notable increase in size and ambition. As a consequence, Mr. Sloane will usher the Stavanger Symphony into a new concert hall in 2010. ...
read full bioAmerican conductor Steven Sloane is a versatile and dedicated musician. A visionary, Sloan’s extraordinarily creative concepts have garnered him respect in artistic circles, as well as in the realm of cultural politics.
Steven Sloane, a former student of Eugene Ormandy, Franco Ferrara, and Gary Bertini, is currently head conductor of two dynamic ensembles. Since becoming music director of the Bochumer Symphoniker in 1994, Steven Sloane has transformed the ensemble into the leading orchestra of the German Ruhrgebiet region.
In 2007, Steven Sloane also became principal conductor of the Stavanger Symphony Orchestra. His tenure began at a time of exciting cultural change for Stavanger, during which the city was named European Cultural Capital of 2008, the orchestra enjoyed a notable increase in size, and plans were made for the symphony to move to a new concert hall by 2010.
As artistic director of Ruhr 2010, Steven Sloane is experiencing an exciting year full of resounding highlights such as the successful “Day of Song,” the finale of which featured Steven Sloane conducting a choir of 65,000. His goal was to conceive projects for Ruhr 2010 that would have lasting effects on the region. Another exciting project is the Henze-Project. 40 institutions are taking part in over 200 performances of composer Hans Werner Henze’s works, including the world premiere of the youth-opera Gisela, directed by Steven Sloane in September, 2010.
Steven Sloane’s original programming concepts have been awarded twice with the title Best Concert Program by the Deutschen Musikverleger-Verband. One of his most noteworthy programs was his Mahler-Ives cycle with the Bochum Symphony in the Essener Philharmonie in 2007. In 2011, he will guest conduct the hr-Sinfonieorchester as well as an all-American program with the MDR Symphony Orchestra.
A well-developed intuition for working with voices has made Steven Sloane a popular opera conductor. He directed the Spoleto Festival (1996-2000), to which he returns this season to conduct Mozart’s Magic Flute in a production by acclaimed directing duo Moshe Leiser and Patrice Caurier, and was artistic director of Opera North in Leeds (1999-2003), where he conducted rarely performed works such as Shostakovich’s operetta Cheryomushki and Schumann’s Genoveva, in addition to traditional repertoire such as Tosca, Falstaff, and Tristan and Isolde. He has conducted at Covent Garden (Le nozze di Figaro), the Deutsche Oper Berlin (Das schlaue Füchslein), the Houston Grand Opera (The Makropoulos Affair), and at festivals in Hong Kong (Salome) and Santa Fé (Katja Kabanova). In September 2008, Steven Sloane conducted the world premiere of Stewart Wallace’s Bonesetter’s Daughter at the San Francisco Opera.
Steven Sloane has championed contemporary music throughout his career, most notably as music director of the American Composers Orchestra (2002-2006), with which he premiered many new compositions at Carnegie Hall in New York City. In 2006, he premiered Elliot Goldenthal’s opera Grendel at the Los Angeles Opera. That same year, he and the Los Angeles Opera opened the Lincoln Center Festival. In 2008, he returned to Lincoln Center with the Bochumer Symphoniker to perform the spectacular RuhrTriennale production of Bernd Alois Zimmermann’s opera Die Soldaten.
Steven Sloane has worked with top orchestras since the beginning of his career, including in Israel where he took up residence in 1981. He was named first Kapellmeister of the Frankfurt Opera in 1988, conductor of the New York City Opera in 1990, and music director of the Long Beach Opera in Los Angeles in 1992. Steven Sloane regularly guest conducts the world’s leading orchestras, including the San Francisco Symphony Orchestra, Israel Philharmonic, Sydney Symphony, Tokyo Metropolitan Orchestra, hr-Sinfonieorchester, Philharmonia Orchestra London, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra.
Last updated March 2011. Contact Opus 3 Artists for the most up-to-date version.
