Charles Olivieri-Munroe

Charles Olivieri-Munroe is Chief Conductor of the North Czech Philharmonic in Teplice, Principal Conductor of the Colorado ‘Crested Butte’ Festival in the USA and Artistic Director of the Inter-Regionales Symfonie Orchester in Germany.  He has previously been Chief Conductor of the Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra in Bratislava (2001-2004), Resident Conductor of the Brno Philharmonic (1995-97) and of the Karlsbad Symphony Orchestra (1993-95) and Permanent Conductor of Brno Chamber Opera (1992-94).  His international career began after he won a number of international competitions which culminated in him winning First Prize in the 2000 ‘Prague Spring International Music Festival’ Conducting Competition where he also won the prizes offered by Supraphon Records, City of Prague and by Czech Radio.  Under his leadership the North Czech Philharmonic has seen a dramatic increase in its size, budget and international reputation in the last thirteen years with highly praised recordings, commissions of new music, world premieres and live broadcasts.  His recordings with SONY, RCA Red Seal, NAXOS, SMS Classical and Naïve Records can be heard on many of the world’s radio stations.

In season 2009/10 Charles Olivieri-Munroe made extensive tours with the Prague Chamber Orchestra (Asia), the Prague Philharmonic (France) and Orchestra del Conservatorio di Svizzera-Italiana (Switzerland).  During the course of the season he guest conducted major orchestras in Amsterdam, Taipei, Warsaw, Prague, Bratislava and Istanbul as well as orchestras in Germany and Spain.

Charles Olivieri-Munroe launches his 2010/11 season with an opera production of Verdi’s Aida at the festival Lago di Como and makes several debuts this season in Japan (Nagoya Symphony Orchestra), France (l’Orchestre National des Pays de La Loire), with the Südwestfalen Philharmonie, Dessau Philharmonic, Moscow Philharmonic, Santiago Symphony in Chile and the Odense Symphony Orchestra in Denmark. In January 2011 Olivieri-Munroe returns to Nordwestdeutche Philharmonie for a German tour and tours with the Israel Chamber Orchestra in June 2011.

Charles Olivieri-Munroe's hold on public imagination stems from a combination of talent and charisma.  He is increasingly recognized in the international press for his innovative programming, interpretation of Slavic repertoire and his passion for purity of orchestral sound.  His career takes him across five continents, appearing with many of the world’s finest orchestras including the Israel Philharmonic, Czech Philharmonic, Montreal Symphony Orchestra, Berlin Deutches Symphonie-Orchester, St. Petersburg Philharmonic, Danish National Radio Symphony, Budapest Symphony, Warsaw Philharmonic, Royal Brussels Philharmonic, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Oregon Symphony Orchestra and orchestras in New York, Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Athens, Istanbul, Lisbon, Tokyo, Seoul and Mexico City.  

In the opera house, Charles Olivieri-Munroe has appeared at the Berlin Komische Oper conducting Verdi’s Falstaff, at Il Teatro Fenice in Venice, in Amsterdam where he presented the Netherlands National Ballet in a crossover production entitled Body and Voice and during his time with the Brno Chamber Opera when he led such diverse productions as Handel’s Acis and Galatea and Czech composer Ilya Hurnik’s Diogenes.  He made his debut in Milan conducting Mozart’s Don Giovanni and he returns this summer to conduct Aida in the festival Lago di Como.  He recently made his debut at the Prague National Opera with Dvorak’s Stabat Mater and opened the Prague State Opera’s 2009/10 season conducting a pair of spectacular gala performances of music by Bohuslav Martinu.  This season he was the music director in Warsaw for a new production of Stravinsky’s Rake’s Progress.

Charles Olivieri-Munroe grew up in Toronto where he studied the piano with the eminent pedagogue, Boris Berlin, at the Royal Conservatory of Music and at the University of Toronto.  Following his graduation in 1992 he won three Ontario scholarships to study conducting with Otakar Trhlik at the Janacek Academy of Music in Brno, Czechoslovakia.  He became a student of Jiri Belohlavek and spent two summers (1995/96) at L’Accademia Musicale Chigiana in Siena studying with Ilja Musin and Yuri Temirkanov.  In 1997 Charles Olivieri-Munroe was a recipient of the $20,000 career grant from the Canada Council for the Arts.

Today, Charles Olivieri-Munroe is a key personality with the major musical institutions in Prague including the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, Prague Spring International Festival and Prague Academy of Music where he has recently been appointed to the conducting faculty by Jiri Belohlavek. 

He has discovered and given premiere performances of music by the famous Czech composers Martinu (Nocturne), Karel Ancerl (Sinfonieta), Smetana (From My Life) and Janacek’s original version of the opera Jenufa.