Short biography
Since 2024, the French Maestro VICTORIEN VANOOSTEN has served as the principal guest conductor of the LNSO. In 2021, invited to the Vilnius Piano Festival organised by Mūza Rubackytė, he led the LNSO in a programme of French music. Subsequently he delivered a number of spectacular orchestral music concerts. Vanoosten admits that he immediately felt admiration for the professionalism of the Lithuanian National Symphony Orchestra and fell in love with Vilnius.
Vanoosten received his musical education at the Paris Conservatoire, where he studied piano with Michel Béroff. He also studied conducting at the aforementioned Conservatoire and the Sibelius Academy of Music in Helsinki, where he was mentored by such luminaries as Esa-Pekka Salonen, Alain Altinoglu, Leif Segerstam, David Zinman, Peter Eötvös and Pierre Boulez. In 2016, he won the ADAMI Conducting Competition. Vanoosten has received fellowships from Société Génerale Mécénat Musical and Fondation Banque Populaire.
Vanoosten was assistant conductor to Daniel Barenboim at Berlin’s Staatsoper Unter den Linden and assistant conductor at Opéra de Marseille. In 2019, he served as the conductor of Ensemble Symphonique Neuchâtel in Switzerland, as well as principal conductor of ensembles and projects such as Orchestre Symphonique du Pays Basque and DEMOS, a French youth orchestra founded by Philharmonie de Paris. Maestro has conducted productions of Cherubini’s Médée (Medea) and Bizet’s Les pêcheurs de perles (The Pearl Fishers) at the Deutsche Oper Berlin and has collaborated with several other European opera houses.
The highlights of Vanoosten’s recent years include the new production of Bizet’s Les pêcheurs de perles (The Pearl Fishers) at Théâtre du Capitole de Toulouse, conducting the same opera at Berlin’s Staatsoper Unter den Linden; his debut at Oper Frankfurt and Vienna’s Musikverein; his return to the Tonkünstler-Orchester, the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Lithuanian National Symphony Orchestra with works by R. Strauss, Bruckner, Debussy, Ravel and other composers. Notables are the new production of Bizet’s Carmen at Opéra de Marseille and his debut at the helm of Montreal’s Orchestre Métropolitain, new productions at Opernhaus Zurich and Opéra de Marseille, his work with Gewandhausorchester at Oper Leipzig, and an invitation to the Teatro alla Scala. Vanoosten has also led Orchestre national d’Île-de-France in concerts at Philharmonie de Paris and conducted a new production of La Traviata in Saint-Étienne.
The Republic of France has recognised Vanoosten’s significant contribution to the arts by making him a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts at des Lettres in 2023.
For more information visit victorienvanoosten.com
