English Profile

Shigekazu Yonezaki (Conductor)
After receiving a master’s degree from the Science University of Tokyo, Shigekazu Yonezaki decided to pursue a musical career and enrolled in the Performance Diploma Course of the Conducting Department at Tokyo College of Music. He studied conducting under Kazue Kamiya, Yasuhiko Shiozawa, Welisar Gentscheff, Junichi Hirokami, and Yuji Yuasa. In 1999, he participated in the Hungarian International Raba Festival.
Yonezaki has built up a reserve of experience and musical refinement working as a conductor and assistant conductor with opera companies and orchestras throughout Japan. In 2003 he attracted a great deal of attention when he was selected as one of the top three finalists (no grand prix awarded) in his first appearance at the 48th Besancon International Conductors Competition, a gateway to recognition for young conductors. In July 2004 he conducted the Beethoven violin concerto in a joint performance with Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra concertmaster Rainer Kuchl.
Thus far Yonezaki has served as guest conductor with the Orchestre National de Lyon, the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra, the Tokyo City Philharmonic Orchestra, the New Japan Philharmonic Orchestra, the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra, the Nagoya Philharmonic Orchestra, the Kyushu Symphony Orchestra, the Osaka Century Symphony Orchestra, the Sendai Philharmonic Orchestra, and the Gunma Symphony Orchestra. He also spent a year from September 2006 as a conductor trainee with the Slovak National Theatre.
In April 2008 Yonezaki received high praise for his appearance as invited guest conductor in a regular concert of the Slovak Sinfonietta of Zilina (Slovak Zilina National Chamber Orchestra), and again conducted this orchestra in a regular concert in February 2009. He is scheduled to appear once again as guest conductor in a regular concert of the orchestra in February 2010.