Yutaka Sado

Yutaka Sado was born in Kyoto (Japan) and attended the Kyoto City  University of the Arts. In 1987 he studied with Leonard Bernstein and Seiji Ozawa at the Tanglewood Music Festival and became Bernstein’s assistant during his concert tour with the Schleswig-Holstein Festival Orchestra. He won the Premier Grand Prix of the 39th International Competition for Young Conductors Besançon in 1989 and later the first prize in the Leonard Bernstein International Competition (1995). Sado assisted Bernstein and Michael Tilson Thomas in founding the Pacific Music Festival in Sapporo (Japan), where he appeared as permanent conductor and guest conductor. In 1993 Sado was appointed chief conductor of the Orchestre des Concerts Lamoureux; he was soon able to tie in the orchestra’s reputation with the legendary era of Igor Markevitch. In 1999 he was appointed First Guest Conductor of the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano “Giuseppe Verdi”. Sado is a regular guest with leading orchestras including the Orchestre de Paris, the Orchestre National de France, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, the Konzerthausorchester Berlin, the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden, the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, the Deutsche Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, the Orchestra Sinfonica dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, the Orchestra Sinfonica Nazionale della RAI and the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande. In his home country he has been the artistic director of the Hyogo Performing Arts Center since 2005.