Marc Soustrot

Conductor Marc Soustrot is a native of Lyon; he graduated in 1969 from Lyon Conservatoire with a degrees in trombone and piano performance and then took up conducting with Manuel Rosenthal at the Paris Conservatoire. Soustrot worked as an assistant to André Previn with the London Symphony Orchestra and, in 1976, was named a deputy conductor with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Pays de Loire and eventually moved up to chief conductor, a position he held until 1994. In 1996, Soustrot accepted the dual posts of serving as chief conductor of the Beethovenhalle Orchestra in Bonn and the Brabant Orkest in Eindhoven. In 2002, Soustrot stepped down from the post in Bonn, but continued to lead the Brabant Orkest; he frequently appears in Bonn as a guest conductor. Soustrot is considered a specialist in French orchestral literature; in his early career, he was also deeply involved in contemporary music, leading premieres of works by Claude Baliff, Alain Louvier, and Maurice Ohana. In later years, Soustrot concentrated his efforts more into opera, leading among many others the opera companies in Nantes, Opera Island Kristiansand, and at Monte Carlo, Manuel Rosenthal's longtime stomping ground. In the field of opera, he is well known for making a specialty of Offenbach, but has also enjoyed success in modern works such as Ernst Krenek's opera Karl V.