MARC MINKOWSKI TO BE BOSTON BAROQUE’S SECOND-EVER MUSIC DIRECTOR

The French conductor brings his sense of humor and expressive delight to the podium.

 
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French conductor Marc Minkowski will take over artistic leadership of Boston Baroque starting in the 2026-27 season, opening a new chapter for the half-century-old period-instrument orchestra following the spring 2025 retirement of founding music director Martin Pearlman.

In his first season, Minkowski will lead three of Boston Baroque’s five concerts: Haydn’s The Seasons in September, a Beethoven-focused New Year’s Celebration concert, and an evening including Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater in the spring.

The annual performance of Handel’s Messiah will be led by Christoph Koncz, while Lionel Meunier will lead the spring opera, a double bill of John Blow’s Venus and Adonis and Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas.

-The Boston Globe

 
 
 

French conductor Marc Minkowski, known for his breadth of repertoire over the span of his 50+ year career as a conductor and one of today’s foremost interpreters of early music, will join Boston Baroque as its Music Director starting in the 2026/27 season.

Involved in artistic leadership since his teenage years, Minkowski, at only 18, founded the internationally renowned ensemble Les Musiciens du Louvre in Paris. He is also the founder of The Ré Majeure Festival in France, the former artistic director of the Mozartwoche in Salzburg, and, from 2016 to 2021, the General Manager of Opéra national de Bordeaux. He regularly conducts top orchestras, including the Vienna Philharmonic, the Kanazawa Ensemble Orchestra in Japan, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and the Berlin Philharmonic.

Minkowski balances his schedule between operatic and symphonic repertoire, conducting at the world’s leading opera houses, including the Royal Opera House, San Francisco Opera, the Zurich Opera, Opéra national de Paris, Wiener Staatsoper, and the Salzburg Festival.

Born and raised in Paris, by an American mother and French/Polish father, Minkowski began his studies at the Monteux School in Maine, and has maintained an international presence, studying and performing around the world. Now, as he steps into his new role as Music Director of Boston Baroque, he is especially excited to reconnect with his American roots, establish a meaningful artistic home in the United States, and deepen his connection with audiences here.

In the 2026/27 season, Minkowski will lead three of Boston Baroque’s five concerts: Haydn’s The Seasons in September, an all-Beethoven New Year’s Celebration concert, and an evening including Pergolesi’s Stabat Mater in the spring.

He is regularly performs in Paris, in productions such as Platée, Idomeneo, The Magic Flute, Ariodante, Giulio Cesare, Iphigénie en Tauride, Mireille, Alceste (Opéra national de Paris); Sémélé, The Marriage of Figaro, Messiah, La Périchole (Théâtre des Champs Élysées); La Belle Hélène, La Grande-Duchesse de Gérolstein, Carmen, Les Fées (Théâtre du Châtelet); La Dame blanche, Pelléas et Mélisande, La Chauve-Souris, Mârouf by Rabaud, Cendrillon, and Manon by Massenet (Opéra Comique). At the Opéra national de Bordeaux, he has conducted Pelléas et Mélisande, Mârouf, La Vie Parisienne, The Barber of Seville, Manon, Les Contes d’Hoffmann, and Robert le diable by Meyerbeer.

His busy calendar includes performances throughout Europe, including Aix-en-Provence (The Coronation of Poppea, The Marriage of Figaro, The Abduction from the Seraglio, Idomeneo, Don Giovanni, and Il Turco in Italia), Brussels (La Cenerentola, Don Quichotte, Les Huguenots, Le Trouvère), Geneva (Les Huguenots, La Juive), Zurich (Il Trionfo del Tempo, Giulio Cesare, Agrippina, Les Boréades, Fidelio, La Favorite), Venice (Le Domino noir), Teatro alla Scala in Milan (Lucio Silla, L'Enfant et les Sortilèges, and L'Heure espagnole), Liceu de Barcelona (Manon), Valencia (Les Contes d’Hoffmann), Berlin (Robert le Diable, Il Trionfo del Tempo, Mitridate), Salzburg (The Abduction from the Seraglio, Mitridate, Così fan tutte, Lucio Silla), Vienna (Hamlet and Der Fliegende Holländer at the Theater an der Wien, Armide and Alcina at the Staatsoper), Amsterdam (Gounod's Roméo et Juliette, Iphigénie en Aulide and Iphigénie en Tauride, Gounod's Faust), London (Idomeneo, La Traviata, and Don Giovanni at Covent Garden), San Francisco (Don Giovanni), and Moscow (Pelléas et Mélisande). In January 2023, he conducted the Mozart / Da Ponte Trilogy at the Opéra Royal de Versailles in Ivan Alexandre's production, the culmination of a project that began at the Drottningholm Festival in Sweden in 2015, and was also performed at Liceu de Barcelona and the Opéra national de Bordeaux.

In recent years, he has collaborated with various stage directors in the opera world, including Sir Richard Eyre, Klaus Michael Grüber, Vincent Huguet, Laurent Pelly, Olivier Py, Dmitri Tcherniakov, and Krzysztof Warlikowski. As part of the Mozartwoche in Salzburg, he programmed innovative productions, including special presentations of Mozart's sacred repertoire (Davide Penitente and Requiem, presented in an equestrian version in collaboration with Barbabas) and Handel (Messiah, directed by Bob Wilson, later performed at the Grand Théâtre de Genève and Théâtre des Champs-Élysées).

He has also been invited to conduct some of the most renowned American orchestras, including the Cleveland Orchestra and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, as well as Japanese orchestras like the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra and the Kanazawa Orchestra Ensemble. He has also led performances with Russian orchestras like the Mariinsky Orchestra and the National Youth Symphony Orchestra of Russia, as well as various European orchestras, including the BBC Symphony Orchestra, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Vienna Philharmonic, Vienna Symphony Orchestra, Mozarteum Orchestra of Salzburg, Berlin Philharmonic, Berlin State Opera Orchestra, German Symphony Orchestra Berlin, Dresden State Orchestra, Bamberg Symphony, Saarland State Orchestra, SWR Symphony Orchestra, Basel Chamber Orchestra, Maggio Musicale Fiorentino Orchestra, National Orchestra of Spain, Prague Philharmonia, Swedish Radio Orchestra, and Finnish Radio Orchestra. Not to mention, he has also worked with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, the National Orchestra of the Capitole, and the Orchestra of the Centre-Val de Loire Tours.

Highlights of Minkowski’s 2025/26 season includes Cosi fan tutte at the Staatsoper Berlin, a new production of Offenbach’s rarely performed Robinson Crusoé at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris, Handel’s Giulio Cesare in Egitto at Les Arts in Valencia, La Clemenza di Tito at Opernhaus Zürich, the New Year’s Eve gala concert with Boston Baroque, Haydn’s ​​Le Stagioni with Orchestra del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino, Handel’s Concerti Grossi with Les Musiciens du Louvre at the Accademia nazionale di Santa Cecilia, and a tour of Handel’s Orlando with Les Musiciens du Louvre. 

His busy calendar includes performances throughout Europe, including Aix-en-Provence (The Coronation of Poppea, The Marriage of Figaro, The Abduction from the Seraglio, Idomeneo, Don Giovanni, and Il Turco in Italia), Brussels (La Cenerentola, Don Quichotte, Les Huguenots, Le Trouvère), Geneva (Les Huguenots, La Juive), Zurich (Il Trionfo del Tempo, Giulio Cesare, Agrippina, Les Boréades, Fidelio, La Favorite), Venice (Le Domino noir), Teatro alla Scala in Milan (Lucio Silla, L'Enfant et les Sortilèges, and L'Heure espagnole), Liceu de Barcelona (Manon), Valencia (Les Contes d’Hoffmann), Berlin (Robert le Diable, Il Trionfo del Tempo, Mitridate), Salzburg (The Abduction from the Seraglio, Mitridate, Così fan tutte, Lucio Silla), Vienna (Hamlet and Der Fliegende Holländer at the Theater an der Wien, Armide and Alcina at the Staatsoper), Amsterdam (Gounod's Roméo et Juliette, Iphigénie en Aulide and Iphigénie en Tauride, Gounod's Faust), London (Idomeneo, La Traviata, and Don Giovanni at Covent Garden), San Francisco (Don Giovanni), and Moscow (Pelléas et Mélisande). In January 2023, he conducted the Mozart / Da Ponte Trilogy at the Opéra Royal de Versailles in Ivan Alexandre's production, the culmination of a project that began at the Drottningholm Festival in Sweden in 2015, and was also performed at Liceu de Barcelona and the Opéra national de Bordeaux.

In recent years, he has collaborated with various stage directors in the opera world, including Sir Richard Eyre, Klaus Michael Grüber, Vincent Huguet, Laurent Pelly, Olivier Py, Dmitri Tcherniakov, and Krzysztof Warlikowski. As part of the Mozartwoche in Salzburg, he programmed innovative productions, including special presentations of Mozart's sacred repertoire (Davide Penitente and Requiem, presented in an equestrian version in collaboration with Barbabas) and Handel (Messiah, directed by Bob Wilson, later performed at the Grand Théâtre de Genève and Théâtre des Champs-Élysées).

He has also been invited to conduct some of the most renowned American orchestras, including the Cleveland Orchestra and the Los Angeles Philharmonic, as well as Japanese orchestras like the Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra and the Kanazawa Orchestra Ensemble. He has also led performances with Russian orchestras like the Mariinsky Orchestra and the National Youth Symphony Orchestra of Russia, as well as various European orchestras, including the BBC Symphony Orchestra, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Mahler Chamber Orchestra, Vienna Philharmonic, Vienna Symphony Orchestra, Mozarteum Orchestra of Salzburg, Berlin Philharmonic, Berlin State Opera Orchestra, German Symphony Orchestra Berlin, Dresden State Orchestra, Bamberg Symphony, Saarland State Orchestra, SWR Symphony Orchestra, Basel Chamber Orchestra, Maggio Musicale Fiorentino Orchestra, National Orchestra of Spain, Prague Philharmonia, Swedish Radio Orchestra, and Finnish Radio Orchestra. Not to mention, he has also worked with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, the National Orchestra of the Capitole, and the Orchestra of the Centre-Val de Loire Tours.