Leopold Hager. Austrian conductor Leopold Hager studied conducting, organ, piano, harpsichord and composition at the Mozarteum in his hometown Salzburg. After holding several posts in Mainz, Linz and Cologne he became General Music Director in Freiburg, then Principal Conductor of the Mozarteum Orchestra in Salzburg, Music Director of the RTL Symphony Orchestra Luxembourg and served as Chief Conductor at the Volksoper in Vienna. Besides his work as a conductor, for many years Leopold Hager served as Professor for Orchestra Conducting at the University of Music in Vienna.
As a guest he has enjoyed a long-standing relationship with the Vienna State Opera and made frequent appearances at many of the world’s leading opera houses, amongst them Bayerische Staatsoper Munich, Semperoper Dresden, Metropolitan Opera New York, Chicago Lyric Opera, Royal Opera House Covent Garden London, Teatro Colón Buenos Aires and Opéra Bastille Paris.
On the concert podium, Hager conducted major orchestras in Europe and the USA, including Staatskapelle Dresden, Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, Munich Philharmonic, Bamberg Symphony, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Orchestre de Paris and National Symphony Orchestra Washington. In 2015, he assumed the post of Principal Guest Conductor of the Orquestra Sinfónica do Porto Casa da Música. He has also repeatedly conducted the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra in Vienna, Prague and Rome.
Leopold Hager acquired renown as a pioneering advocate of Mozart interpretation, especially for his Salzburg concert performances of the hitherto virtually unperceived early stage works, amongst them Lucio Silla, Apollo et Hyacinthus, Ascanio in Alba or La Betulia liberata. In the course of the Salzburg Mozart Week in 1979, he conducted the first ever complete performance of Il sogno di Scipione. His recordings of these works with the leading singers of the time still stand out as a point of reference.