Fabrice Bollon
is a French composer and conductor. He studied conducting and composition in Paris and at the Mozarteum in Salzburg with, among others, Nikolaus Harnoncourt and Michael Gielen. He continued his education with Georges Prêtre and Mauricio Kagel, who he was assistant to for six years.

He conducts numerous works by composers of various genres (Nunes, Hölszky, Kagel, etc.) and participates in prestigious festivals of contemporary music (Festival d’Automne Paris, ATTACA Festival Basel, Donaueschinger Musiktage, Neue Musik Darmstadt, etc.). As a result, he takes on musical ideas of all kinds and he is a member of a rock band and familiar with jazz.

As a busy conductor (chief conductor of the Symphony Orchestra of Flanders, then Deputy director of music of the Opera Chemnitz, director of music at the Theater Freiburg im Breisgau) he performs in Holland, Germany, Austria, Hungary, Japan, and Russia, with both contemporary and classical symphonic works and opera.

His works are characterized by a deep knowledge of various contemporary music styles, ranging from pop music to progressive avant-garde music. These trends merge into a homogeneous and personal language. He treats humor and drama in an equally carefree manner and often makes use unusual instrumentation. For him the process of composing is not the main goal: the music is defined by listening and not by the score.

His compositions are performed by musicians such as the Swingle Singers, Martin Lücker, Wolfgang Schmidt or the Belgrade Philharmonic Orchestra. His concert for e-cello and orchestra celebrated a resounding success at its premiere in 2011 at the ‘Meisterkonzerte Karlsruhe’ by Johannes Moser and the Deutsche Radiophilharmonie Saarbrücken. The major German orchestras, including the radio orchestras of the SWR, MDR and SR, regularly premiere his orchestral works. His latest concerto, Your voice out of the lamb (for recorders and small orchestra), written for Michala Petri, premiered in 2017 in Odense (Denmark) and received standing ovations.

His opera Oscar und die Dame in Rosa, after the story of Éric-Emmanuel Schmitt, was unanimously welcomed by the German critics and acclaimed by the audience: the planned 12 performances were sold out.

Die Welt: “The composing director Fabrice Bollon succeeded with the Éric-Emmanuel-Schmitt setting “Oscar and the Lady in Pink” the rare case of a truly family-friendly and even thoughtful comedy.”