Justus Frantz

Studied piano with Elise Hansen in Hamburg and Wilhelm Kempf in Positano, and conducting with Wilhelm Brückner-Rüggeberg. The pianist gained international fame in 1970 when he was invited to work with Herbert von Karajan. In 1986 Justus Frantz founded the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival and was its artistic director for many years. He made it one of the most important festivals in Europe and created a format that became a model for many other festival institutions.

For 10 years he hosted the successful television show «Attention! Classics», for which he was awarded the Golden Camera in 1993.

Artistic Director of the Philharmonia of the Nations Orchestra, which he founded in 1995 with Leonard Bernstein and Yehudi Menuhin. With this ensemble he has given more than a thousand concerts. He regularly works with the Berlin, Vienna, China, Japan and London Philharmonic Orchestras, the Orchestre de Paris, the Mariinsky Theatre Symphony Orchestra and the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra (London) among others. His annual «Frantz & Friends» festival on Gran Canaria is one of the perennial centres of international musical life.