Howard Arman
Howard Arman (born 1954 in London) is an English choral conductor and opera director. He won the Handel Prize of the Handel Festival, Halle, in 1996, shaped the festival's orchestra and conducted operas of George Frideric Handel. He is a conductor of the Theater and Philharmonie Thüringen, also the Luzerner Theater. Since 2017 he is the Director of the Bayerische Rundfunk Chor. Career. Howard Arman studied at the Trinity College of Music in London. He first worked with leading British ensembles, but moved to Austria and Germany in 1981. Arman has conducted (among others) the radio choirs  of the Norddeutscher Rundfunk, the Südwestrundfunk, the Österreichischer Rundfunk and the RIAS Kammerchor. From 1983 to 2000 he was the leader of the Salzburger Bach-Chor and since 1998 he has been director and artistic leader of the MDR Rundfunkchor, the choir of the Mitteldeutscher Rundfunk (MDR). He is general music director of Theater and Philharmonie Thüringen for the 2010/2011 season and musical director of the Lucerne theatre for three years from the 2011/12 season onwards. Since 2010/11 he has been the musical leader of the Luzerner Sinfonieorchester (LSO), with James Gaffigan as the LSO's conductor. In 1984 he  prepared the Tölzer Knabenchor for a recording of Bach's "Mass in B minor" with Andrew Parrott and the Taverner Consort and Players Starting in 1993 he shaped the Händel-Festspielorchester, the orchestra of the Handel Festival, on period instruments, which earned him the Festival's Handel Prize of 1996. He conducted Handel's opera "Tolomeo" in 1996 at the festival, probably the first production and recording of the work with period instruments. In 2000 he recorded Rachmaninoff's "All-Night Vigil" with the MDR-Rundfunkchor. In 2005 Arman conducted Purcell's "Dido and Aeneas" at the Luzerner Theater. In  2006 Arman conducted Handel's opera "Admeto" at the Handel Festival, directed by Axel Köhler and recorded. In 2009 he recorded in the Marktkirche in Halle, the church where Handel was baptized, the opening concert of the "Handel Special Day", a collaboration of 40 broadcasters. Four choirs and two orchestras reconstructed a memorial concert, held for the composer in 1784 in Westminster Abbey, including "Zadok the Priest" (one of Handel's Coronation Anthems). In 2010 Arman conducted Mozart's "Le nozze di Figaro" at the Luzerner Theater, directed by David Herrmann. Arman recorded Heinrich Ignaz Franz Biber's "Marienvesper 1693