Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra

Manfred Honeck is widely regarded as one of the world's leading conductors, celebrated for his distinctive and revelatory interpretations that have garnered international acclaim. As Music Director of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, where he is now in his 19th season, he continues to shape the orchestra’s artistic identity with a deep sense of purpose and passion. His tenure, recently extended through the 2032–2033 season, has seen the orchestra flourish artistically while strengthening its role as a cultural ambassador for the city of Pittsburgh. Celebrated at home and abroad, the orchestra has appeared at Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center in New York, as well as at major venues throughout Europe and prestigious festivals such as the BBC Proms, Salzburg Festival, Musikfest Berlin, Lucerne Festival, Rheingau Music Festival, and Grafenegg Festival.

Manfred Honeck's acclaimed Pittsburgh tenure is reflected in an extensive discography on the Reference Recordings label, featuring works by Beethoven, Brahms, Bruckner, Shostakovich, Strauss, Tchaikovsky, and others. These recordings have received widespread critical acclaim and multiple GRAMMY® nominations, including a win for "Best Orchestral Performance" in 2018. In August 2025, he and the orchestra released Requiem: Mozart’s Death in Words and Music, an original concept reimagining a funeral mass for Mozart, combining the composer’s Requiem with Gregorian chant, poetry, and other choral works by Mozart. 

Born in Austria, Manfred Honeck completed his musical training at the University of Music and Performing Arts Vienna. His years as a violist with the Vienna Philharmonic and Vienna State Opera Orchestra have had a lasting influence on his work as a conductor, and his approach to interpretation is rooted in a desire to venture deep beneath the surface of the music. He began his conducting career as an assistant to Claudio Abbado and as director of the Vienna Jeunesse Orchestra. Subsequently, he was engaged by the Zurich Opera House, where he was awarded the European Conducting Prize in 1993. He has since served as one of three principal conductors of the MDR Symphony Orchestra Leipzig, as Music Director of the Norwegian National Opera, Principal Guest Conductor of the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra and Czech Philharmonic Orchestra, and Chief Conductor of the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra in Stockholm. In 2023, he was appointed Honorary Conductor by the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra, following decades of close collaboration.  

Manfred Honeck also enjoys a distinguished profile as an opera conductor. In his four seasons as General Music Director of the Staatsoper Stuttgart, he conducted premieres of operas by Berlioz, Mozart, Poulenc, Strauss, Verdi, and Wagner. He has also appeared as a guest conductor at major institutions such as Semperoper Dresden, Komische Oper Berlin, the Royal Opera of Copenhagen, and the Salzburg Festival. In 2020, Beethoven’s anniversary year, he conducted a new staging of Fidelio (1806 version) at the Theater an der Wien. In autumn 2022, he made his much-acclaimed debut at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, leading a revival of Mozart’s Idomeneo. Beyond the podium, Manfred Honeck has created a series of symphonic suites, including Janáček’s Jenůfa, Strauss’s Elektra, Dvořák’s Rusalka, as well as Puccini's Turandot, which he regularly performs around the globe. The most recent arrangement, based on Strauss's Arabella, received its premiere with the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra in 2025.

As a guest conductor, Manfred Honeck appears regularly with many of the world's leading orchestras, including the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Berlin Philharmonic, the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, the Staatskapelle Dresden, the Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, the Philharmonia Orchestra London, the Orchestre de Paris, and the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia. In the United States, he has conducted many of the nation’s most distinguished ensembles. He has also been Artistic Director of the International Wolfegg Concerts in Germany for over three decades. 

In summer 2026, he returns to the Salzburg Festival to conduct Ariadne auf Naxos with the Vienna Philharmonic. He will also lead the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra on a European festival tour, with appearances in Salzburg, Lucerne, Amsterdam, Hamburg, and at the opening concert of the season at the Vienna Konzerthaus. In the 2026/27 season, he will commemorate the 200th anniversary of Ludwig van Beethoven’s death with special programs and a new commission from Jüri Reinvere, to be presented worldwide.

Manfred Honeck holds honorary doctorates from several universities in the United States and has been awarded the honorary title of Professor by the Austrian Federal President. In 2018, the jury of the International Classical Music Awards declared him "Artist of the Year." In 2026, he received the Julio Kilenyi Medal from the American Bruckner Society, an honor bestowed on distinguished interpreters of Bruckner.

First prize winner of the 18th International Chopin Piano Competition 2021 in Warsaw, Bruce Liu’s “playing of breathtaking beauty” (BBC Music Magazine) has secured his reputation as one of the most exciting talents of the new generation.

As Focus Artist of the 2024 Rheingau Musik Festival, Liu features in five performances ranging from a solo recital to chamber music and concerto performances with hr-Sinfonieorchester, Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, and Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich.

Highlights of the 2024/25 season include international tours with Orchestre philharmonique du Luxembourg and Gustavo Gimeno, London Symphony Orchestra and Sir Antonio Pappano, hr-Sinfonieorchester and Alain Altinoglu, Wiener Symphoniker and Marie Jacquot, Orchestre National de France and Cristian Măcelaru, as well as Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra and Lahav Shani. He also tours extensively in play-direct programmes with the Academy of St Martin in the Fields and Amsterdam Sinfonietta.

In 2024/25, Bruce Liu makes highly anticipated debuts with the Boston Symphony Orchestra at Tanglewood Music Festival, Danish National Symphony Orchestra, WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln, Cincinnati Symphony, Houston Symphony and Minnesota Orchestra. He also appears with the Orchestra dell'Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra in London.

He has performed with major orchestras including Los Angeles Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony, The Philadelphia Orchestra, Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, Philharmonia Orchestra London, and NHK Symphony Orchestra. Liu’s collaborations with distinguished conductors include Ryan Bancroft, Myung-Whun Chung, Paavo Järvi, Fabio Luisi, Joana Mallwitz, Santtu-Matias Rouvali, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Gianandrea Noseda, Rafael Payare, Vasily Petrenko, and Dalia Stasevska.

As an active recitalist, Liu has performed at major concert halls such as the BOZAR Brussels, Wigmore Hall, Philharmonie de Paris, and Tokyo Opera City. In 2024/25, he returns to the Carnegie Hall, Théâtre des Champs Elysées and Concertgebouw Amsterdam as well as major venues in Asia and gives his recital debut at Wiener Musikverein and Prinzregententheater Munich. Liu appears at various international festivals, including Klavier Festival Ruhr, Festival de Pâques d'Aix-en-Provence, Aspen and Tanglewood Music Festivals, Verbier, La Roque d'Anthéron, Edinburgh International Festival, and Gstaad Menuhin Festival.

An exclusive recording artist with Deutsche Grammophon, Liu was awarded Opus Klassik’s ‘Young Talent Of the Year’ prize 2024 for his debut studio album ‘Waves’. His first album featuring the winning performances from the International Chopin Piano Competition received international acclaim including the “Best Classical Albums of 2021” from Gramophone Magazine.

Bruce Liu studied with Richard Raymond and Dang Thai Son. Born in Paris to Chinese parents and raised in Montréal, Liu’s phenomenal artistry has been shaped by his multi-cultural heritage: European refinement, North American dynamism, and the long tradition of Chinese culture.

Armenian Soprano Lilit Davtyan is a graduate of the Yerevan State Conservatory. In 2016, she was admitted to the piano department of the Conservatory while continuing to attend vocal courses, receiving her Bachelor’s degree in 2020 followed by a Master’s degree in 2022. From 2018 to 2021, she worked as an accompanist, simultaneously performing as a singer at the Yerevan State Conservatory's Opera Studio.

In September 2021, she joined the Young Opera Artists Program of the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow where she has since been studying vocal with the Artistic Director of the Program, Dmitry Vdovin. In addition, she has taken part in Master classes with Malcolm Martineau, Sergei Leiferkus, Ildar Abdrazakov, Evamaria Wieser, Semion Skigin, Alessandro Amoretti, Giulio Zappa, Mzia Bakhtouridze and many others. 

Alongside studying and working, Lilit has successfully participated in many competitions, with prizes including First Prize in the XII International Competition-Festival of Young Performers, Russia in 2016, the first prize at the Concorso Internazionale Musicale Città di Pesaro in 2019, the second prize and the special prize at the José Carreras Grand Prix of the Elena Obraztsova Foundation in Moscow in 2021, and the special prize for interpretation of Rachmaninoff songs at the International Rachmaninoff Competition in Moscow in 2022. She was also a 2022 finalist in the internationally renowned Neue Stimmen singing competition. 

Recent highlights include participating in the Salzburg Festspiele’s Young Singers Project for their 2023 season. With them, she performed the roles Der Lehnstuhl, Die Prinzessin and Die Fledermaus in Ravel’s L’enfant et les sortileges, as well as taking part as a soloist in the Herbert von Karajan Young Conductors Award, performing under the baton of the first prize winner, Hankyeol Yoon. 

Lilit is currently part of the Deutsche Oper Berlin ensemble. With them, season highlights include Pamina in Mozart’s Die Zauberflöte, Corinna in Rossini’s Il viaggio a Reims, Lauretta and Suor Genovieffa in Puccini’s Gianni Schicchi and Suor Angelica, Marzellina in Beethoven’s Fidelio, Zerlina in Mozart’s Don Giovanni,  Susanna in Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro, and Hirt in Wagner’s Tannhäuser. 

Reza Vali was born in Ghazvin, Persia (Iran) in 1952. He began his music studies at the Conservatory of Music in Tehran. In 1972 he went to Austria and studied music education and composition at the Academy of Music in Vienna. After graduating from the Academy of Music, he moved to the United States and continued his studies at the University of Pittsburgh, receiving his Ph.D. in music theory and composition in 1985. Mr. Vali has been a faculty member of the School of Music at Carnegie Mellon University since 1988. He has received numerous honors and commissions, including the honor prize of the Austrian Ministry of Arts and Sciences, two Andrew W. Mellon Fellowships, commissions from the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, Kronos Quartet, the Seattle Chamber Players, and the Arizona Friends of Chamber Music, as well as grants from the Pennsylvania Council on the Arts and the Pittsburgh Board of Public Education. He was selected by the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust as the Outstanding Emerging Artist for which he received the Creative Achievement Award. Vali's orchestral compositions have been performed in the United States by the Pittsburgh Symphony, the Seattle Symphony, the Boston Modern Orchestra Project, the Baltimore Symphony, the Memphis Symphony Orchestra, and Orchestra 2001. His chamber works have received performances by Cuarteto Latinoamericano, the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble, Kronos Quartet, the Seattle Chamber Players, and the Da Capo Chamber Players. His music has been performed in Europe, China, Chile, Mexico, Hong Kong, and Australia and is recorded on the Naxos, New Albion, MMC, Ambassador, Albany, and ABC Classics labels.