Nikolaj Szeps-Znaider is a regular guest conductor of the world’s leading orchestras, including the Chicago Symphony, Cleveland Orchestra, Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal, Bamberg Symphony and the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra. He inaugurated his first season as Music Director of the Orchestre National de Lyon in September 2021. Following an outstandingly successful opera debut conducting Mozart’s Magic Flute at the Dresden Semperoper, he was immediately re-invited to conduct R. Strauss’ Der Rosenkavalier at the house in autumn 2019. He has since returned to Dresden Semperoper for a revival of Der Rosenkavalier and made his debut at the Royal Danish Opera conducting a new production of the Magic Flute. Also a virtuoso violinist, Nikolaj Szeps-Znaider maintains his reputation as one of the world’s leading exponents of the instrument with a busy calendar of concerto and recital engagements. He enjoys a strong relationship with the London Symphony Orchestra, an orchestra he has worked with extensively both as conductor and as soloist. Together they have recorded the complete Mozart Violin Concertos, directed from the violin by Szeps-Znaider. His extensive discography also includes Nielsen’s Violin Concerto with Alan Gilbert and the New York Philharmonic and Elgar’s concerto with Sir Colin Davis and the Dresden Staatskapelle, award-winning recordings of the Brahms and Korngold concertos with Valery Gergiev and the Vienna Philharmonic, the Beethoven and Mendelssohn concertos with Zubin Mehta and the Israel Philharmonic, Prokofiev’s Concerto no. 2 and Glazunov’s concerto with Mariss Jansons and the Bavarian Radio Symphony, and Mendelssohn’s concerto on DVD with Riccardo Chailly and the Gewandhaus Orchestra. He has also recorded the complete works of Brahms for violin and piano with Yefim Bronfman. Nikolaj Szeps-Znaider is passionate about supporting the next generation of musical talent, and is President of the Nielsen Competition, which takes place every three years in Odense, Denmark. Nikolaj Szeps-Znaider plays the Kreisler Guarnerius del Gesu 1741 on extended loan to him by The Royal Danish Theater through the generosity of the VELUX Foundations, the Villum Fonden and the Knud Højgaard Foundation.