John Traill is Principal Conductor of the City of Southampton Orchestra, the Oxfordshire County Youth Orchestra, Ensemble ISIS, Associate Conductor with the London Contemporary Music Group, and Director of Music at St. Anne? College, Oxford. Trained by Rossen Milanov at the Mt. Vitosha International Conducting Institute in Bulgaria, John has also worked closely with Jonathan Sternberg, Christopher Adey, and composer Robert Saxton.

 

Hailed as one of the most promising conductors of his generation, and also known for his strong interpretative instinct (Guardian, 2008), John has performed internationally with orchestras in the UK, France, Bulgaria, Russia, the Ukraine, and the USA. He won 2nd prize at the Vakhtang Jordania International Conducting Competition in 2006, and was a prize-winner at the 8th Leeds Conductor? Competition in 2005.

 

In 2008 John’s guest engagements included the Tete-a-Tete Opera Festival, the Orquestra Filharmonia Jaragua do Sul (Brazil), the Oxford Philomusica, the London Contemporary Music Group, the Guernsey Camerata, and the Schools Prom at the Royal Albert Hall. He has recently recorded Thomas Hyde’s Autumnal for Toccata Classics, with soloist Edward Vandespar, and Laurynus Lubas’ The Caretaker’s Symphony for Grayscale films, to be released at the BFI, and in Beijing, later this year. Previous broadcasts on BBC Radio 3 have included concerts with the City of Southampton Orchestra, the premier of Thomas Hyde’s Scherzo Capriccioso, and reviewing for CD Review.

 

Orchestras that John has conducted include the London Mozart Players, the Kharkov Philharmonic, the Sofia New Symphony Orchestra, Radius, and the Moscow Studio for New Music. In 2007 he premiered Tim Benjamin’s The Corley Conspiracy at the Southbank Centre, Jean Hasse? film-score Faust at the Barbican, and directed a residency at Oxford University with Sir Harrison Birtwistle, the London Sinfonietta, and Ensemble ISIS.

 

Also a composer, John is the youngest person to have been awarded a DPhil in composition at the University of Oxford (2006). His most recent works include Five Piano Miniatures for Gregory Martin (USA), Little Concertino for Six for the LCMG, Horn Trio (Hommage Ligeti) for Radius at London’s Southbank Centre, Dissolving Frangments for Violin and Piano, and The Short Voyage for the Oxfordshire County Youth Orchestra.