Matthias Pintscher is the newly appointed Music Director of the Kansas City Symphony (KCS), effective from the 2024-25 season. He launched his tenure with the KCS with a highly successful tour to Europe in August, with concerts at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, the Berlin Philharmonie, and Hamburg’s Elbphilharmonie.

Pintscher recently concluded a decade-long tenure as the Music Director of the Ensemble Intercontemporain (EIC), the iconic Parisian contemporary ensemble founded by Pierre Boulez and winner of the 2022 Polar Prize of the Royal Swedish Academy. During his stewardship, he led this adventurous institution in the creation of dozens of world premieres, made recordings of music by cutting edge composers from all over the world, and took the ensemble on tours around the globe – to Asia, North America, and throughout Europe to all the major festivals and concert halls.

The 2024-25 season will see Pintscher in his fifth year as Creative Partner at the Cincinnati Symphony, where he will conduct a subscription week and a Proof series concert. As guest conductor, he returns to the New York Philharmonic, Houston Symphony, San Diego Symphony, Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra, Gürzenich Orchestra Cologne, Oslo Philharmonic, BBC Scottish Symphony, Barcelona Symphony, Orquesta Nacional de España, Orchestre National de Radio France, and the Boulez Ensemble.

Pintscher has conducted several opera productions, including with the Staatsoper Berlin (Wagner’s Lohengrin and The Flying Dutchman, and Beat Furrer’s Violetter Schnee last season) and the Wiener Staatsoper (Olga Neuwirth’s Orlando).

Pintscher is also well known as a composer, and his works appear frequently on the programs of major symphony orchestras throughout the world. In August 2021, he was the focus of the Suntory Hall Summer Festival, a week-long celebration of his works with the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra as well as a residency by the EIC with symphonic and chamber music performances. His third violin concerto, Assonanza, written for Leila Josefowicz, was premiered in January 2022 with the Cincinnati Symphony. Another 2021-22 world premiere was neharot, a co-commission of Suntory Hall, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, Los Angeles Philharmonic, and Staatskapelle Dresden, where he was named Capell-Compositeur. In the 2016-17 season, he was the inaugural composer-in-residence of the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, and from 2014 to 2017, he was artist-in-residence at the Danish National Symphony Orchestra, as well as composer-in-residence at Salzburg Festival and Lucerne Festival.

Pintscher has held several titled positions, most recently as the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra’s Artist-in-Association for nine seasons. In 2020, he was Music Director at the Ojai Festival, and in 2018-19, he served as the Season Creative Chair for the Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich and Artist-in-Residence at the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra. An enthusiastic supporter of and mentor to students and young musicians, Pintscher was Principal Conductor of the Lucerne Festival Academy Orchestra, and ran the Heidelberger Atelier, an academy for young musicians and composers, from 2005 to 2018. He has also worked with the Karajan Academy of the Berlin Philharmonic, Music Academy of the West, National Orchestral Institute, and Junge Deutsche Philharmonie. He appears regularly with the New World Symphony in Miami, a training orchestra for post-conservatory, pre-professional musicians. Pintscher has been on the composition faculty of the Juilliard School since 2014.

Matthias Pintscher began his musical training in conducting, studying with Pierre Boulez and Peter Eötvös in his early twenties, when composing soon took a more prominent role in his life. He rapidly gained critical acclaim in both areas of activity and continues to compose in addition to his conducting career. A prolific composer, Pintscher's music is championed by some of today's finest performing artists, orchestras, and conductors. His works have been performed by such orchestras as the Boston Symphony, Chicago Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Philadelphia Orchestra, Berlin Philharmonic, London Symphony Orchestra, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, and the Orchestre de Paris, among many others. He is published exclusively by Bärenreiter, and recordings of his works can be found on Kairos, EMI, Teldec, Wergo, and Winter & Winter.