Justus Frantz

Justus Frantz was born in 1944 in the town of Hoenzalts (now Inowrocław, Poland). At the age of four, he began studying piano under Professor Eliza Hansen. He then studied at the Hamburg State University of Music and perfected his skills under one of the great pianists of the XX century, Wilhelm Kempff.

In 1967, he became the youngest scholarship holder of the German National Education Foundation and won II Prize at the ARD International Music Competition in Munich (in the chamber music category). This marked the beginning of Justus Frantz’s brilliant performing career, with important milestones including his debuts with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Herbert von Karajan (1970) and the New York Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Leonard Bernstein (1975), and collaborations with conductors such as Yehudi Menuhin, Rudolf Kempe, Georg Solti, Seiji Ozawa, Roger Norrington, Bernard Haitink, Dmitri Kitayenko, Arvid Jansons, Colin Davis, Saulius Sondeckis and others.

In the same period, he plays in a piano duo with Christoph Eschenbach (in the early 1980s, at the invitation of Sviatoslav Richter, they performed all of Mozart’s four-hand works at the «December Nights» festival).

As a conductor, he has performed with the philharmonic orchestras of Vienna, Munich, Osaka (Japan), Durban (South Africa), the London Symphony and Philharmonic Orchestras, the Paris Orchestra, the Zurich Tonhalle Orchestra, the Italian Radio and Television Symphony Orchestra, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Sinfonia Varsovia (Warsaw) and Philharmonia Hungarica (Marl, Germany) orchestras, and ensembles from Romania, Bulgaria, Lithuania, Armenia, Georgia, China, Japan, and South Korea.

Justus Frantz works extensively in Israel: he conducted at the Classics on the Red Sea Festival in Eilat (2011) and staged «The Marriage of Figaro» with the Israeli Opera (Tel Aviv) at the amphitheatre in Bet She’an. Since 2013, he has been the music director and principal conductor of the Israel Sinfonietta chamber orchestra (Beer Sheva) – the first principal conductor of an orchestra in Israel’s history to be invited from Germany. The maestro pays great attention to building bridges between representatives of different nations and confessions living in Israel; one of his projects in this area is performances by an international choir in which Jews, Muslims and Christians sing together. Since 2015, he has been the artistic director of the «Spring in the Negev» festival.

He has performed with Russian soloists and ensembles on numerous occasions. His stage partners include Valery Gergiev, Yuri Bashmet, Alena Baeva, Alexander Rudin, the Mariinsky Theatre Symphony Orchestra, the Svetlanov State Academic Symphony Orchestra of Russia, the Academic Symphony Orchestra of the Moscow Philharmonic, the New Russia State Symphony Orchestra, and the Moscow State Symphony Orchestra. He conducted opera performances at the Mariinsky Theatre and, as musical director and conductor, staged «The Magic Flute» (1993) and «The Marriage of Figaro» (1994). In 2006, he conducted Mozart’s Requiem at the «Stars of the White Nights» festival. In 2008, he conducted the Tchaikovsky Grand Symphony Orchestra at the opening of the Sviatoslav Richter International Piano Competition in Moscow. In 2017, he conducted Orff’s «Carmina Burana» at the Mariinsky International Far East Festival in Vladivostok. In July 2022, he conducted the Mariinsky Theatre Symphony Orchestra in a performance of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. Since 2022, he has been a regular performer at the Mariinsky Theatre, conducting works by Bach, Mozart, Beethoven, Brahms and Dvořák. In February 2025, the artist gave a solo piano concert, «Mistakes in Music», in the Stravinsky Hall.

Justus Frantz has earned a reputation as an outstanding organiser. In 1986, he created the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival, served as its artistic director for nine years, and turned it into one of the world’s most notable music events. He was also a co-founder of the festival in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and the inspiration behind the festival in Rheingau.

Since 1999, he has been the artistic director of the Finca Festival Frantz & Friends summer music forum, which takes place in the Canary Islands. Among other projects, the maestro has organised festivals in various countries around the world, including the first major festival of Russian music in Hamburg and a festival of new music in the USSR. In recent years, he has been a regular guest at the International Festival of Sacred Music and Art in Rome. Justus Frantz is the founder of the Felix Mendelssohn Society in Hamburg and the Johannes Brahms Society in Schleswig-Holstein. On his initiative, the Royal Court Theatre in Bad Wildbad was renovated, where the «Rossini in Wildbad» opera festival has been held since 1989. Justus Frantz’s educational ideas have been realised in a number of television projects, including the programme «Attention! Classics», for which he received numerous awards. As the founder and director of the charitable humanitarian organisation «Bridge of Friendship», the maestro has implemented various projects in the USSR, Russia, the CIS and Baltic countries, Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, and Bulgaria.

One of Justus Frantz’s main areas of activity is the search for, training and support of young talent. Every year, he gives numerous free concerts for young audiences. The Paul Hindemith Prize in Schleswig-Holstein, established by Frantz, has become one of the most prestigious awards for young composers.

He was a professor of piano at the Hamburg State College of Music and Performing Arts (since 1991 – Hamburg College of Music and Theatre). In 1989, he co-founded (together with Valery Gergiev) the Soviet-German Youth Philharmonic Orchestra.

In 1995, he organised the youth symphony orchestra «Philharmonie der Nationen», which brought together musicians from more than forty countries. Under the maestro’s baton, the ensemble performed Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony in Berlin at a gala concert to mark the work’s designation as a UNESCO World Cultural Heritage Site. The orchestra’s line-up is constantly changing. During the tour, Justus Franz listens to young musicians, discovering new names. This is how many artists who later became world famous began their international careers, including violinists Vadim Repin, Maxim Vengerov and Midori Goto, whom Franz invited to the festival in Schleswig-Holstein; Anna Netrebko, who made her debut at the Mariinsky Theatre in the role of Susanna in a production of «The Marriage of Figaro» under his baton; Bulgarian violinist and composer Martin Panteleev; and Hungarian violinist József Lendvai.

Since 1989, he has been a Goodwill Ambassador for the UN Refugee Agency. He has received many awards from Germany, Spain, Russia, Israel, Lithuania and other countries. He is a Knight of the Order of Friendship (2025).