Patrick Fournillier – conductor

Invited by the major opera houses as an expert in French operatic repertoire, he performed at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, the Bayerische Staatsoper, the Dresden Semperoper, Palau de les Arts Reina Sofia in Valencia, the Maggio Musicale Fiorentino in Florence, the Washington National Opera, often collaborating with Placido Domingo. M°Fournillier received the Grand Prix du Disque for his recording of French opera arias with Natalie Dessay and the Philharmonic Orchestra of Monte Carlo. During his tenure as Music Director of the Orchestra Sinfonica Arturo Toscanini in Parma, he linked his name to the Verdi celebrations in 2001. Patrick Fournillier recently conducted: Don Pasquale at the Norske Opera in Oslo; Carmen at the Zurich Opernhaus and Manon Lescaut at the Semperoper in Dresden. As returning guest at the San Francisco Opera Patrick Fournillier gained great success conducting Alfano’s Cyrano and Offenbach’s Les Contes d’Hoffman.

Future plans: Il Barbiere di Siviglia at the Palm Beach Lyric Opera; Les Pécheurs de perles at the Teatro Regio in Parma and on tour in Modena; L’Etoile at the Nederlandse Opera in Amsterdam; Thaïs and a lyric concert at the Pacific Opera in Los Angeles.