His idiosyncratic yet at the same time highly accessible programmes, in which the great orchestral repertoire is combined with music from the 20th century, are reaching an ever bigger and wider audience. His credo: “We are not a museum, but a platform for living music.”

With a permanent appointment at Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, a residency at Cité de la Musique in Paris, regular concerts in the Grosses Festspielhaus in Salzburg and invitations from the festivals in Besançon and Strasbourg, Michel Tabachnik and the orchestra are consolidating the sound international reputation built up over the past few years.

The programme for the near future includes concerts at the Musikverein in Vienna and various tours in countries including Germany and the United Kingdom.

The positive reviews for orchestra and chief conductor leave no doubt, as can be seen from this one on the performance of Terretektorh by Xenakis: “With the energy and verve to which we have become accustomed from him in Brussels, Michel Tabachnik, chief conductor of the Brussels Philharmonic, applied himself to this difficult exercise; the results are already recorded in the annals.” (La Libre Belgique, March 2010).

Michel Tabachnik studied piano, composition and conducting in Geneva. After his studies, he was coached by a number of iconic conductors: he was Igor Markevitsj’s assistant in Madrid and for four years acted as assistant conductor of Pierre Boulez, mainly with the BBC Symphony Orchestra in London. After this Herbert von Karajan invited him to conduct his orchestra in Berlin for a number of years.

As a good friend of Stockhausen, Berio, Ligeti and Messiaen, Michel Tabachnik has conducted a number of world premières, including many works by Iannis Xenakis, who considers him his favourite interpreter.

Michel Tabachnik has been chief conductor of various major orchestras including the Gulbenkian Foundation Orchestra in Lisbon, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Lorraine and the Ensemble InterContemporain in Paris. He has also conducted the Berliner Philharmonic, the Koninklijk Concertgebouworkest, the Tokyo NHK, the Orchestre de Paris and at festivals in Lucerne, Salzburg and Aix-en-Provence.