Howard Griffiths

Howard Griffiths was born in England. He studied at the Royal College of Music London, and has held the post of Generalmusikdirektor at the Brandenburgisches Staatsorchester Frankfurt since the concert season 2007/08. In 1981 he settled in Switzerland, and has since then been much-in-demand internationally as a guest conductor with renowned orchestras such as the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra London, the Orchestre National de France, the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the Warsaw Philharmonic, the WDR Sinfonieorchester Cologne, the Radiophilharmonie Hanover, the Deutsche Radiophilharmonie Saarbrücken in Kaiserslautern, and the English Chamber Orchestra. Together with the Collegium Novum Zurich, Howard Griffiths conducted the Swiss debut performance of Hans Werner Henze’s Requiem, with the composer himself attending the concert. Furthermore, he has worked together with other important contemporary composers such as Mauricio Kagel, Sofia Gubaidulina, Arvo Pärt, and Helmuth Oehring. His cooperation with the Kammerorchester Zurich, whose artistic director he was between 1996 and 2006, had already begun several years earlier. It was his leadership that enabled the ensemble to continue its tradition and re-established it within the national and international music scene. The almost one-hundred CD recordings which Howard Griffiths has produced with labels such as cpo, Warner, Universal, Sony, and Koch, and which contain standard canonic works as well as contemporary music and re-discovered music from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, demonstrate his wide range of artistic interests. Howard Griffiths has supported the work of young musicians for more than two decades. This is particularly prominent in his activities as the artistic director of the Orpheum Stiftung zur Förderung junger Solistinnen und Solisten; a position he has held since 2000. In early 2006, Howard Griffiths was appointed Member of the British Empire (MBE) by Queen Elizabeth II in recognition of his services to musical life in Switzerland.