Biography

Pablo Heras-Casado is Principal Guest Conductor at Teatro Real in Madrid and Director of the Granada Festival—a month-long festival of music, art, and dance in his hometown of Granada. He also enjoys a long-term collaboration with the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra that includes extensive touring and recording projects. He currently serves as Conductor Laureate of the Orchestra of Saint Luke’s, following his tenure as principal conductor from 2011 to 2017. He made his San Francisco Symphony debut in 2010 and became a Shenson Young Artist in 2013.

This season Mr. Heras-Casado is the Spotlight Artist of the NTR Matinee series at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, conducting the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic, Freiburg Baroque Orchestra, and the Mahler Chamber Orchestra. He makes his debuts with the Pittsburgh Symphony and the Montreal Symphony Orchestra and conducts Wagner’s Das Rheingold at Teatro Real in Madrid, starting his first-ever complete Ring Cycle, spanning across four consecutive seasons. In recent seasons, Mr. Heras-Casado has appeared in North America with the New York and Los Angeles philharmonics, Boston and Chicago symphonies, Philadelphia Orchestra, and Metropolitan Opera, and made his debuts with the Dallas Symphony and Verbier Festival Orchestra, among others.

Mr. Heras-Casado records primarily for Harmonia Mundi, and is the recipient of the Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik, two Diapason d’Or, and a Latin Grammy. His discography includes a series of recordings entitled Die Neue Romantik, featuring the music of Schumann, Mendelssohn, and other Romantic composers with Freiburg Baroque Orchestra and partners such as Isabelle Faust, Jean-Guihen Queyras, and Alexander Melnikov. In 2018, he releases dedicated albums of Debussy, with the Philharmonia Orchestra; Bartók with the Munich Philharmonic and Javier Perianes; a DVD release of Wagner’s Der fliegende Holländer at Teatro Real; plus Monteverdi’s Selva morale e spirituale with the Balthasar-Neumann-Chor & Ensemble. He has also recorded on Deutsche Grammophon, Decca, and Sony Classical.

Musical America’s 2014 Conductor of the Year, Mr. Heras-Casado holds the Medalla de Honor of the Rodriguez Acosta Foundation and the Ambassador Award of the Regional Government of Andalusia. He is an Honorary Ambassador and recipient of the Golden Medal of Merit by the Council of Granada, as well as an Honorary Citizen of the Province of Granada. In 2018 he was awarded the Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the French government. A Global Ambassador for the Spanish charity Ayuda en Acción, Mr. Heras-Casado promotes the charity’s work internationally to eradicate poverty and injustice in the world.