Tugan Sokhiev was born in 1977 in Vladikavkaz. After studying conducting with Anatoli Briskin for two years, he began to study with Ilya Musin in St. Petersburg. In 2001 he graduated from St. Petersburg State Conservatoire (Yuri Temirkanov’s class).

In 2002 Tugan Sokhiev made his debut at the Welsh National Opera (La Bohème), followed by his Metropolitan Opera debut in 2003 (Eugene Onegin). The same year, the conductor appeared for the first time with the Philharmonia orchestra in London, performing Rachmaninoff’s Second Symphony. In 2004 he conducted The Love for Three Oranges at the festival in Aix-en-Provence, followed by successful revivals in Luxembourg and at the Teatro Real in Madrid. In 2006 he conducted an acclaimed performance of Boris Godunov at the Houston Grand Opera.

Since 2005 Tugan Sokhiev collaborates with the Mariinsky Theatre where he has performed premieres of productions of the operas Il viaggio a Reims, Carmen and The Tale of Tsar Saltan. Tugan Sokhiev has also conducted the operas The Golden Cockerel, Iolanta, Samson et Dalila, The Fiery Angel and Carmen at the Mariinsky Theatre.

Since 2008, he has been Principal Conductor and Artistic Director of the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse; previously, for several years he had been Principal Guest Conductor and Artistic Director of that orchestra. Discography with ONCT includes numerous highly-acclaimed recordings for Naïve Classique –Tchaikovsky’s Fourth and Fifth Symphonies, Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition, Rachmaninov’s Symphonic Dances and Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf and most recently Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring and Firebird.

Since 2010 until the end of the 2015–16 season Tugan Sokhiev has also been Principal Conductor of the Deutsche Symphonie-Orchester Berlin. Tugan Sokhiev has conducted a series of concerts in Vienna, Ljubljana, Zagreb, San Sebastian and Valencia as well as in various towns and cities in France, Germany, Austria, Croatia, Spain, China and Japan.

In 2009 the conductor made his debut with the Wiener Philharmoniker. Tugan Sokhiev has conducted the operas The Queen of Spades and Iolanta at the Théâtre du Capitole de Toulouse. In 2011 he conducted the opera Aida with the Orchestre national du Capitole de Toulouse at the Chorégies d’Orange festival.

Recent seasons have included critically-acclaimed débuts with Chicago Symphony, London Symphony Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra, Leipzig Gewandhaus, Vienna and Berlin Philharmonics and European touring with the Philharmonia and Mahler Chamber orchestras. He has toured extensively with ONCT - across Europe, Asia, United Kingdom and South America. He has also appeared as a guest conductor with Rotterdam Philharmonic, National Philharmonic of Russia, Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, RAI Turin, La Scala’s concert series, Bournemouth Symphony, Orchestra of the Bayerische Staatsoper in Munich, Strasbourg, Montpellier, Frankfurt, Swedish Radio, Vienna Radio, Frankfurt Radio Symphony, Oslo Philharmonic, Royal Concertgebouw, Munich Philharmonic, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France and Orchestre National de France.

The 2015/16 season included projects with the Vienna Philharmonic at the Mozartwoche Festival, Finnish Radio, NHK Symphony and Philharmonia Orchestra.

In 2014 Tugan Sokhiev was appointed Music Director and Principal Conductor of the Bolshoi Theatre.
He conducts La Bohème, La Traviata; as a member of the production team he took part in a concert performance of the opera The Maid of Orleans (2014), Carmen (2015) and Katerina Izmailova (2016).

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