Olivier Tambosi, who was born in Paris, studied philosophy and theology at Vienna University and opera directing at the Vienna Music Academy. He formed Austria’s first independent opera group, the Neue Oper Wien (N.O.W.) in 1989 and was Artistic Director of the company until 1993. His productions for N.O.W. included Bastien und Bastienne, Joseph & the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, Idomeneo, Medea, Die Zauberflöte, Prima la Musica (Salieri), Macbeth, La Serva Padrona, Simplicius Simplicissimus (K. A. Hartmann), Il Segreto di Susanna, Pimpinone, Don Pasquale and Lulu.

Between 1993 and 1996 Olivier Tambosi was Artistic Director for Opera at the Stadttheater in Klagenfurt, where he directed L’Elisir d’amore, Manon Lescaut, La voix humaine, Death in Venice, Der Vetter aus Dingsda (Künnecke), Cosi fan Tutte, Cavalleria Rusticana, I Pagliacci, Dolores (Kaufmann), Rigoletto and Les Contes d’Hoffmann.

Since 1996 his engagements have included new productions of Rosenkavalier and Lulu at the Nationaltheater Mannheim, I Pagliacci and Le Pauvre Matelo (Milhaud) at the Liceo, Barcelona, Macbeth and La Traviata for the Opera du Rhin, Strasbourg, Hänsel und Gretel at the Nationaltheater Weimar, Jenufa and La Boheme in Hamburg, Die Entführung aus dem Serail, The Rake’s Progress and Lulu in Klagenfurt, Tristan und Isolde in Berne, the Schönberg/Weill Cancons del Cabaret and a revival of Jenufa at the Liceo, Barcelona, and Pelleas et Melisande and Orfeo ed Euridice in Nuremberg. In Berne he directed a new production of Saariaho’s l’Amour de Loin and for Opera Zuid in the Netherlands a new production of Rigoletto. He also directed new productions of Irrelohe at the Vienna Volksoper; Rigoletto in Dublin; Wozzeck in Mannheim; Pierrot Lunaire at Gidon Kremer’s Les Muséeiques festival in Basle; and Lucia di Lammermoor in Linz. At the Royal Opera, Covent Garden he directed productions of Jenufa and Luisa Miller.

In the USA Olivier Tambosi has directed Jenufa at the Metropolitan Opera, New York (also for Los Angeles Opera); for the Lyric Opera of Chicago new productions of Falstaff (which he revived at the 2003 Saito Kinen Festival in Japan and in Houston), Un Ballo in Maschera (also for Houston Grand Opera) and Manon Lescaut (also for San Francisco Opera); and a Zemlinsky double-bill of Der Zwerg and Eine Florentinische Tragödie at the Fisher Center for the Performing Arts, New York.

Recent engagements include new productions of Wozzeck in Klagenfurt; Idomeneo at the Lucerne Festival; La Traviata and Le Nozze di Figaro in Linz; Don Giovanni in Zagreb; Vetter aus Dingsda at the Volksoper in Vienna; Madama Butterfly for the Festival de Mayo in Guadalajara, Mexico; Die Fledermaus in Dortmund; Lucia di Lammermoor in Bregenz; and Otello for the Nationaltheater Saarbrucken.

Engagements in 2010/11 include new productions of Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg for the Landestheater, Linz; Falstaff in Hanover; Manon Lescaut in Florence; and The Makropoulos Case for San Francisco Opera. Future engagements include new productions of Maria Stuarda in Linz and Otello in Halle, and a revival of The Makropoulos Case for Finnish National Opera in Helsinki.

2010/11