Performer: Kazushi Ono

Kazushi Ono is Music Director of Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra and Orquestra Simfònica de Barcelona i Nacional de Catalunya. In 2016 he became Artistic Consultant to the New National Theatre Tokyo, a position that he will hold until September 2018, after which he will become the Theatre’s Artistic Director of Opera.

He was formerly General Music Director of Badisches Staatstheater Karlsruhe, Music Director of La Monnaie in Brussels, Principal Guest Conductor of Filarmonica Arturo Toscanini. From 2008 to 2017, Kazushi Ono maintained his position as Principal Conductor of Opéra National de Lyon, during which he attracted international critical acclaim with landmark performances of works such as Prokofiev’s The Gamblers, Berg’s Lulu and Wagner’s Parsifal, thus reinforcing the company’s reputation for creating a series of new productions, including the compelling double bill of Dallapiccola’s Il prigioniero and Schoenberg’s Erwartung (2013); Beethoven’s Fidelio, in Lyon and at the Edinburgh International Festival (2013); Britten’s Peter Grimes and The Turn of the Screw(2014); Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande , Berlioz’s La Damnation de Faust (2015), and Shostakovich’s Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk (2016).

Following his tenure as Principal Conductor in Lyon, he was awarded ‘Officier de l’ordre des Arts et des Lettres’ by French cultural minister Françoise Nyssen, a further distinguished title adding to the prestigious Asahi Prize, given in January 2015, for his contribution to Japanese society. This award distinguishes individuals who have greatly contributed to the development and progress of Japanese culture and society at large.