Juan Sebastián Acosta

Conductor from March 2014 to March 2017

Juan Sebastián Acosta, born in Bogotá in 1980, started his musical education at the Conservatorium of the Columbian National University in 1992 where he received his diploma in 2002. Juan Sebastián Acosta refined his studies at the ‘Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst’ in Vienna, where he studied orchestral conducting with Uros Lajovic and choral conducting with Erwin Ortner – finishing with “magister atrium”. Since March 2014, he has held the position of Principal Conductor of the Orchester der Technischen Universität in Vienna – with his farewell concert in December 2016 with Brahms’ Ein deutsches Requiem – as well as Music Director Opera Jove de Catalunya Barcelona.

In 2010, Juan Sebastián Acosta was awarded the First Prize at the „Professor Dichler Wettbewerb 2012“ in Vienna, and in November 2012, he was Semi-Finalist at the „IX Grzegorz Fitelberg International Competition for Conductors“ [Filharmonia Slaska, Katowice].

Conducting master classes with Andrés Orozco-Estrada in Vienna and Bogota, as well as lied interpretation master classes with Peter Schreier [Hochschule für Musik Weimar, 2006] supplemented his artistic training.

In 2014, Juan Sebastián Acosta conducted the Orquesta Sinfónica Nacional de Colombia with Schubert’s Great Symphony. He returned to this orchestra with two programmes (Copland, Dvořák, Gershwin, Schubert) in September and October 2015. In 2013, Juan Sebastián Acosta conducted concerts with the Orquesta Filarmónica de Bogotá – an orchestra with whichhe made his debut in 2006. In 2012, Juan Sebastián Acosta conducted the Filharmonia Slaska Orchestra during the „IX Grzegorz Fitelberg International Competition for Conductors“ in Katowice. In 2011, he performed concerts with Radio-Symphonieorchester Vienna, Filharmonia Padkarpadka Rzeszow and the Philharmonic Orchestra Lugansk (Ukraine).

At Opera de Sant Feliu Llobregat in Barcelona and at Auditorio Municipal Terrassa, Juan Sebastián Acosta conducted Donizetti's L’ elisir d’ amore, Mozart's Don Giovanni, Puccini's Madama Butterfly and Tosca, Rossini's Il barbiere di Siviglia and Verdi's Rigoletto since 2012. In 2013, he made his debut at the Salzkammergut Festwochen Gmunden, conducting Mozart’s Così fan tutte, and conducted performances of Beethoven’s Fidelio with Vienna’s Orchester der Technischen Universität in 2015.

As a singer Juan Sebastián Acosta has been a member (chorus tenor and soloist) of the Arnold Schoenberg Chor Vienna under the baton of Erwin Ortner since 2003. In 2010, he performed Erster Gefangener in Beethoven‘s Fidelio conducted by Claudio Abbado at the Lucerne Festival, which was recorded by DECCA.