Marius Stravinsky was born in 1979 in Kazakhstan. He started playing the violin when he was four at the Moscow Central Music School. He continued his studies at the Yehudi Menuhin School in Great Britain from the age of ten and three years later became the first former Soviet student to secure a scholarship in music at Eton College in the UK. He is a graduate and a scholarship winner of the Royal Academy of Music in London (2002). Stravinsky´s passion for conducting began through meeting Mariss Jansons and playing Bruch Concerto for him at the age of 13. In the summer of 1998 he assisted Claudio Abbado in rehearsals of Peter Brook´s production of Don Giovanni at the Aix-en Provence Festival.
In September 2002, Stravinsky accepted the position of Assistant Conductor of the Moscow Philharmonic and the Moscow Helikon Opera, studying with Vladimir Ponkin. His three year conducting residency at the Helikon Opera included performance runs of Lulu (Berg), Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk (Shostakovich), Les Dialogue des Carmelites (Poulenc), The Story of Real Man (Prokofiev), Kashchey the Immortal (Rimsky-Korsakov), Siberia (Giordano), Mavra (Stravinsky) and Carmen (Bizet).
He has also worked with numerous ensembles including the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Russian National Orchestra, St Petersburg Chamber Orchestra, Belarusian State Academic Symphony Orchestra, National Orchestra of Malta, Slovenian National Philharmonic, Hessisches Staatstheater Orchester and Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano Giuseppe Verdi.
In 2007 Stravinsky was appointed Chief Conductor and Artistic Director of the Karelia Philharmonic Orchestra and he held this position until 2012. After making his highly successful debut at the Mariinsky Theatre in February 2012, he was immediately re-invited for further performances. Vladimir Jurowski invited Marius Stravinsky to be his assistant with the London Philharmonic Orchestra in 2013-2015.
He is also a regular guest conductor at the Mikhailovsky Theatre in St Petersburg and the Staatballet Berlin. During the 2016-2017 season he became Founder & Music Director of the St Petersburg Festival Orchestra – launched with a performance of Oedipus Rex at the Alexandrinsky Theatre in February 2017. He has also developed a strong relationship with the State Academic Symphony Orchestra “Yevgeny Svetlanov”.
His discography includes world premiere recordings of Brull´s Violin Concerto and Symphony, Jadassohn´s Symphony and Pabst´s Piano Concerto – all on the Cameo Classics label. The Karelia Philharmonic Orchestra and Marius Stravinsky have also released Thomas Blower’s Symphony, Lamia by Dorothy Howell and works by Holbrook as well as a Piano Concerto and Silentium by Zhukov.
Information for October 2019