Sir John Eliot Gardiner

(April 20, 1943) He is a prominent British conductor renowned for his performances of Baroque music on period instruments. Gardiner has made ​​over 250 recordings. He founded both the Monteverdi Choir in 1964 as English Baroque Soloists.

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Yan Pascal Tortelier

He is an internationally renowned French conductor and violinist and is the son of the late cellist Paul Tortelier. Born in Paris, Tortelier has worked and recorded extensively with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra in Manchester — for whom he was Principal Conductor from 1992 to 2003. He also made an acclaimed recording of French music with the cellist Julian Lloyd Webber which included the cello concertos of Saint-Saens and Honegger for Universal Classics. He is also currently the Principal Guest Conductor of the National Youth Orchestra of Great Britain (NYOGB).
Tortelier served in the newly-created post of Principal Guest Conductor of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra from 2005 to 2008. He is currently the Principal Conductor of the Orquestra Sinfônica do Estado de São Paulo (OSESP).

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LEOPOLD STOKOWSKI

Leopold Anthony Stokowski (April 18, 1882 – September 13, 1977) was a British-born, naturalised American orchestral conductor, well known for his free-hand performing style that spurned the traditional baton and for obtaining a characteristically sumptuous sound from many of the great orchestras he conducted.
In America, Stokowski performed with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the NBC Symphony Orchestra, New York Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra, the Houston Symphony Orchestra, the Symphony of the Air and many others. He was also the founder of the All-American Youth Orchestra, the New York City Symphony, the Hollywood Bowl Symphony Orchestra and The American Symphony Orchestra. He conducted the music for and appeared in Disney's Fantasia along with being portrayed by Bugs Bunny in the 1949 Looney Tunes cartoon Long-Haired Hare. Stokowski, who made his official conducting debut in 1909, appeared in public for the last time in 1975 but continued making recordings until June 1977, a few months before his death at the age of 95.

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NEVILLE MARRINER

Sir Neville Marriner (born 15 April 1924) is an English conductor and violinist. Marriner was born in Lincoln and studied at the Royal College of Music and the Paris Conservatoire. He played the violin in the Philharmonia Orchestra, the Martin String Quartet and London Symphony Orchestra, playing with the latter two for 13 years. He later formed the Jacobean Ensemble with Thurston Dart before going to Hancock, Maine in the United States to study conducting with Pierre Monteux at his school there. In 1959, he founded the Academy of St Martin in the Fields chamber orchestra and recorded profusely with them.
Marriner was the first music director of the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, from 1969 to 1978. From 1979 to 1986, he was music director of the Minnesota Orchestra. He was principal conductor of the Stuttgart Radio Symphony Orchestra from 1986 to 1989.
Marriner has recorded for various labels, including Argo, L'Oiseau Lyre, Philips and EMI Classics. His recorded repertoire ranges from the baroque era to 20th century British music, as well as opera. Among his recordings are two CDs of British music for Philips Classics with Julian Lloyd Webber, including acclaimed performances of Benjamin Britten's Cello Symphony and Sir William Walton's Cello Concerto. Marriner also supervised the Mozart selections for the soundtrack of the 1984 film Amadeus.
Marriner was knighted in 1985. He was chairman of the Academy of St Martin in the Fields chamber orchestra until 1992, when he was succeeded by Malcolm Latchem. Marriner holds the title of Life President. He is the father of the clarinettist Andrew Marriner, Principal Clarinet of the London Symphony Orchestra.

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Jean Fournet

The French conductor was born in Rouen 14 April 1913 – died in Weesp 3 November 2008.
Fournet’s father was a flutist who gave him some instruction on the flute and music theory. Fournet was then trained at the Conservatoire de Paris in flute by Gaston Blanquart and Marcel Moyse, and conducting by Philippe Gaubert (himself a flutist). He performed on the flute at age fifteen with the Orchestra of the Théâtre des Arts in Rouen. He first established himself as a conductor in his native country conducting in Rouen 1936-1940, Marseilles 1940-1944, and then as director of the Paris Opéra-Comique 1944-1957. He was also a professor of conducting at the École Normale de Musique de Paris 1944-1962.
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Olga Rudge

Olga Rudge (13 April 1895, Youngstown, Ohio – 15 March 1996) was an American-born concert violinist, now mainly remembered as the long-time mistress of the poet Ezra Pound, by whom she had a daughter, Mary. A gifted concert violinist of international repute, her considerable talents and reputation were eventually eclipsed by those of her lover, in whose shade she appeared content to remain. In return, Pound was more loyal, not to say faithful, to her than to any of his many other mistresses. He dedicated the final stanza of his epic The Cantos to her, in homage and gratitude for her courageous and loyal support of Pound during his 13 year incarceration in a mental hospital after having been indicted for treasonous activities against the United States and in support of Benito Mussolini's Fascist regime. She also defended Pound against the accusation that he was anti-Semitic. During the last 11 years of Pound's life, Rudge was his devoted companion, secretary, and nurse, as he sank into eccentricity and prolonged silences.

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Lily Pons

Lily Pons (April 12, 1898 – February 13, 1976) was a French-American coloratura soprano. Born as Alice "Lili" Joséphine Pons in Draguignan near Cannes, Pons first studied piano at the Paris Conservatory, winning the First Prize at the age of 15. At the onset of World War I in 1914, she moved with her mother and younger sister Juliette (born 22 December 1902) to Cannes, where she played piano and sang for soldiers at receptions given in support of the French troops and at the famous Hotel Carlton that had been transformed into a hospital, and where her mother, Marie Pons, worked as a volunteer nurse orderly. In 1925, encouraged by soprano Dyna Beumer, she started taking singing lessons from Alberto de Gorostiaga in Paris. She successfully made her operatic debut in the title role of Léo Delibes' Lakmé at Mulhouse in 1928 and went on to sing several coloratura roles in French provincial opera houses.

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Gervase Alan de Peyer

Gervase de Peyer was born in London and attended Bedales School. He was awarded a scholarship to the Royal College of Music where he studied clarinet with Frederick Thurston and piano with Arthur Alexander. Towards the end of World War II, when he was aged 18, he joined the Royal Marines Band Service. De Peyer returned to the Royal College of Music after the war and subsequently studied in Paris with Louis Cahuzac. In 1950 he was a founder member of the Melos Ensemble for whom he continued to play until 1974. He conducted their recordings with EMI. Their recordings of chamber music for both woodwinds and strings were reissued in 2011, including the works for larger ensembles which were the reason to found the ensemble, such as Beethoven's Septet and Octet, Schubert's Octet and Ravel's Introduction and Allegro, played with Osian Ellis (harp), Richard Adeney (flute), Emanuel Hurwitz and Ivor McMahon (violin), Cecil Aronowitz (viola) and Terence Weil (cello). From 1956 to 1973 he was principal clarinet of the London Symphony Orchestra. He was a founder member of The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center in New York in 1969 and played with them for 20 years. He has conducted the English Chamber Orchestra, the London Symphony Orchestra, the Melos Sinfonia, he has directed the London Symphony Orchestra Wind Ensemble and is the associate conductor of the Haydn Orchestra. In 1959 he began teaching at the Royal Academy of Music.

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Yefim Bronfman

Yefim "Fima" Naumovich Bronfman (Russian: Ефим Наумович Бронфман; born April 10, 1958) is a Russian-Israeli pianist. He was born in Tashkent, Uzbek SSR, and emigrated to Israel at the age of 15. He now has US citizenship. He made his international debut in 1975 with Zubin Mehta and the Montreal Symphony Orchestra. He made his Carnegie Hall debut in 1989 and gave a series of recitals with Isaac Stern in 1991. He won a Grammy award in 1997 for his recording of the three Bartók piano concertos with Esa-Pekka Salonen and the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Another recording with Salonen, of the concertos of Sergei Rachmaninov, was pirated by the record label Concert Artist and re-issued with the piano part falsely attributed to Joyce Hatto. Bronfman is also devoted to chamber music and has performed with many chamber ensembles and instrumentalists.

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