Schirmer, Ulf

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Schirmer, Ulf

Schirmer, Ulf, German conductor; b. Eschenhausen, near Bremen, Jan. 8, 1959. He received training in composition from Ligeti and in conducting from Horst Stein and Dohnányi. After working as a répétiteur at the Mannheim National Theater (1980), he was named to that position at the Vienna State Opera (1981). He was assistant to Maazel (1982) and Stein (1983) at the Bayreuth Festival, and then conducted at the Vienna State Opera (1984–86), where he subsequently served as first conductor (1986–88). From 1988 to 1991 he was Generalmusikdirektor in Wiesbaden. He appeared as a guest conductor at the Salzburg Festival (1989), with the Vienna Phil. (1992), at Milan’s La Scala (1993), and with the Berlin Phil. (1993), among others. From 1995 to 1999 he was chief conductor of the Danish National Radio Sym. Orch. in Copenhagen.

—Nicolas Slonimsky/Laura Kuhn/Dennis McIntire