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© Sasha Gusov
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Artistic Director of the Cheltenham International Festival of Music from 2005 to 2007, he was Associate Principal Conductor of the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra from 1994 to 2005. After studying composition in London and then conducting with Ilya Musin in Leningrad, his career was launched when he won first prize at the 1988 Leeds Conductors’ Competition. Since then Brabbins has regularly conducted all the major orchestras in the United Kingdom and is much sought-after in Europe, notably in Germany, Holland, Belgium and Scandinavia.
On the concert platform Brabbins is particularly known for his Elgar, Britten and Walton, and also has a strong affinity for the great nineteenth-century Romantics, and for the Russian and French repertoire. He is also one of Europe’s leading interpreters of contemporary music. Since his early days conducting Mozart at the Kirov, Brabbins has conducted for the Deutsche Oper Berlin, English National Opera, Opera North, and in Frankfurt, Montpellier and Athens, in repertoire including Ravel, Poulenc, Smetana, Stravinsky, Shostakovich, Korngold, Schreker, Henze, Eötvös, Tippett, Birtwistle, Gavin Bryars and David Sawer. Conductor of choice for the London Sinfonietta, Ensemble Modern and the Birmingham Contemporary Music Group, from 1999 to 2004 he was the Philharmonia Orchestra’s Music of Today Series Conductor.
Brabbins is much in demand as a recording artist. For Hyperion he has recorded over thirty discs with the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra, including many in the Romantic Piano Concerto and Romantic Violin Concerto series.
e-mail mail@intermusica.co.uk: web http://www.intermusica.co.uk
