Charles Dutoit

Charles Dutoit was born in Lausanne on 7 October 1936 and trained both in his native country and in Geneva, where he joined the Swiss conducting tradition of the time. His education included studies of violin, music theory and viola, in addition to conducting, a discipline he first learned with Haug and later refined with Baud-Bovy, obtaining the corresponding diploma. He completed his training with Galliera and, in 1959, with Münch at Tanglewood.

His first posts were modest: he conducted an amateur orchestra in Renans between 1957 and 1958 and, from 1959, the choir of the University of Lausanne, to which he added the Bach Choir of Lausanne in 1963. In 1964 he became second conductor of the Berne Symphony Orchestra and, in 1967, succeeded Kletzki as principal conductor, a post he held until 1978. Between 1973 and 1975 he conducted the National Symphony Orchestra of Mexico and, from 1976 to 1979, the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra, before being appointed music director of the Montreal Symphony Orchestra in 1977, his most important post. Under his leadership the Canadian orchestra achieved a prominent place in the French-speaking world, thanks to international tours and more than seventy-five recordings that won numerous awards. His recordings of the concertos of Bartók and Prokofiev with his then wife, Martha Argerich, are among the most acclaimed.

In 1990 he took over as music director of the National Orchestra of France and, in 1998, of the NHK Symphony Orchestra in Tokyo. He also conducted the summer festivals in Philadelphia and Saratoga Springs, and appeared as guest conductor with leading orchestras in New York, Boston, Berlin, Cleveland, Chicago, Munich and Los Angeles. In the operatic field he made his debut at Covent Garden in 1983 and at the Metropolitan Opera in 1987.

His legacy is associated above all with the French and Russian repertoire, as well as with tonal music of the twentieth century. His recordings, from Berlioz, including Les Troyens, to Ravel, in a field where, according to some accounts, he has few rivals, show his sense of colour and of lyrical line.