Hugh Wolff

Hugh Wolff is among the leading conductors of his generation.  He has appeared with all the major American orchestras including those of Chicago, New York, Boston, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Cleveland.  Wolff is much in demand in Europe, where he has conducted the London Symphony, the Philharmonia, the Orchestre National de France, Leipzig Gewandhaus, Czech Philharmonic, Israel Philharmonic, Bavarian and Berlin Radio Orchestras, and is a regular guest conductor with orchestras in Canada, Japan, Korea, Scandinavia and Australia. He is also a frequent conductor at summer music festivals.

Music Director of the Belgian National Orchestra, Wolff was principal conductor of the Frankfurt Radio Orchestra (1997-2006).  Together they toured Europe, Japan and China and appeared at the Salzburg Festival.  Wolff was principal conductor and then music director of the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra (1988-2000), with whom he recorded twenty discs and toured the United States, Europe, Japan and the Far East.  Of this partnership, the New York Times wrote: “the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, under the direction of Hugh Wolff, has developed an effortlessly polished sound ... Wolff shapes his interpretations with impeccable taste.” 

A conductor whose interests span baroque performance practice to the championing of new works, Wolff was music director of the New Jersey Symphony (1986-1993) and Chicago’s Grant Park Music Festival (1994-1997). He began his professional career in 1979 as associate conductor of the National Symphony Orchestra under Mstislav Rostropovich.

Wolff has an extensive discography including a complete set of Beethoven symphonies with the Frankfurt Radio Orchestra, music from the baroque to the present with the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, and new works of John Corigliano, Brett Dean, John Harbison, Aaron Jay Kernis and Mark-Anthony Turnage. He has collaborated on CD with Msitislav Rostropovich, Yo-Yo Ma, Joshua Bell, Hilary Hahn, Edgar Meyer, Dawn Upshaw, Jennifer Larmore, Jean-Yves Thibaudet and jazz guitarist John Scofield. Three times nominated for a Grammy Award, Wolff won the 2001 Cannes Classical Award.

Born in Paris to American parents, Wolff spent his early years in London and Washington DC.  His final year in high school, he studied piano with Leon Fleisher and composition with George Crumb.  After graduating from Harvard College in 1975, Wolff won a fellowship to study conducting with Charles Bruck and composition with Olivier Messiaen in Paris. He returned to the United States to continue piano studies with Fleisher at the Peabody Institute.  Throughout his career, Wolff has performed as a pianist in chamber music with orchestral colleagues and guest soloists.

In addition to his performing career, Wolff holds the Stanford and Norma Jean Calderwood Director of Orchestras chair at New England Conservatory.

Wolff and his wife, Judith Kogan, have three sons.