French conductor Marc Minkowski was born on October 4, 1962 in Paris. His passion for music began when he was a college student at the Ecole Alsacienne. In 1979, even before his majority, Marc Minkowski joined the Lille orchestra under the direction of Jean-Claude Casadesus. Marc Minkowski performed very quickly in many orchestras, in particular among pioneer ensembles of the Baroque revival such as Les Arts Florissants or the Clemencic Consort in Vienna. Marc Minkowski quickly took an interest in conducting, which he studied in the United States at the Pierre Monteux Conducting School. At only nineteen, Marc Minkowski founded Les Musiciens du Louvre, an ensemble which took an active part in the Baroque revival, before broadening its repertoire by approaching works by Mozart, Rossini, Offenbach Wagner and many others. Marc Minkowski has been director of the Opéra national de Bordeaux since September 2016, his contract is extended until August 2022.

Christian Thielemann has been one of the great German conductors of our time for years. Born in 1959 in what was then West Berlin, he began his professional career in his native city at the Deutsche Oper under none other than Herbert von Karajan (1908-1989). Via various stations in Karlsruhe and Düsseldorf, among others, he moved to Nuremberg in 1988 as - at that time - the youngest General Music Director. Nine years later, Thielemann returned to Berlin to the Deutsche Oper, then led the Munich Philharmonic from 2004 to 2011, in each case also in the positions of general music director. Thielemann has been involved with the Bayreuth Festival since 2010. In 2015, he was appointed music director there. In the 2012/13 season, he moved to Dresden to join the Sächsische Staatskapelle, and in 2013 he additionally took on the position of artistic director at the Salzburg Easter Festival. Christian Thielemann maintains close ties with the Berlin and Vienna Philharmonic Orchestras.
Thielemann has received numerous awards and honors for his achievements, including his honorary doctorate from the Hochschule für Musik ´Franz Liszt` Weimar, the Richard Wagner Prize, the Prize of the Foundation for the Promotion of the Semper Opera, and honorary membership of the Royal Academy of Music in London and the Gustav Mahler Association Hamburg.