Recognized worldwide for his natural ease and extraordinary collaborative spirit, American conductor James Gaffigan has attracted international attention for his prowess as a conductor of both symphony orchestras and opera. The mutual trust he builds with artists empowers them to cultivate the highest art possible.
Gaffigan is uniquely positioned with Music Directorships at two international opera houses. He is the General Music Director of Komische Oper Berlin, where he begins his second season in 2024-2025, and Music Director of the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía in Valencia, where he enters his fourth season off widely acclaimed productions of Wozzeck, La Bohème, and Tristan und Isolde.
In his 2024-2025 season with Komische Oper Berlin, Gaffigan leads productions of Sweeney Todd, The Marriage of Figaro and Don Giovanni, among others. At Palau de les Arts Reina Sofía, he conducts a varied season of programming including a staging of Der fliegende Holländer. Guest engagements include his debut with the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester and returns to the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks and Luzerner Sinfonieorchester. In the United States, he makes return engagements with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, National Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony and Houston Grand Opera.
During the 2023/24 season, Gaffigan made returns to the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and Civic Orchestra of Chicago, the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, and the St. Louis Symphony. In Summer 2023, Gaffigan led the Metropolitan Opera in their production of La Bohème, as well as the Orchestra de Paris with the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, and Verbier Festival Junior Orchestra. Other recent orchestral appearances include London Symphony Orchestra, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Wiener Symphoniker, Münchner Philharmoniker, Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, Norske Opera and Ballet, Deutsches Symphonie Orchester Berlin, Staatskapelle Berlin, Czech Philharmonic and Luzerner Symphonieorchester. In North America, Gaffigan regularly works with the New York Philharmonic, Cleveland Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, National Symphony Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic and Detroit Symphony Orchestra, among others.
Gaffigan marked his final season as Principal Guest Conductor of both the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra and the Trondheim Symphony Orchestra & Opera in 2022/23. In 2021, he finished his tenure as Chief Conductor of the Luzerner Sinfonieorchester, a position he held for 10 years, where he raised the orchestra’s international profile with highly successful recordings and tours abroad. A regular at the Metropolitan Opera, Bayerische Staatsoper, and Opéra National de Paris, Gaffigan has also conducted the Zürich Opera, Vienna Staatsoper, Staatsoper Hamburg, Dutch National Opera, Glyndebourne Festival, Lyric Opera of Chicago and Santa Fe Opera.
Gaffigan was first prize winner of the 2004 Sir Georg Solti International Conducting Competition, which opened Europe’s doors to him as a young American. In 2009, he completed a three-year tenure as Associate Conductor of the San Francisco Symphony, a position created for him by Michael Tilson Thomas. Prior to that, he was Assistant Conductor of the Cleveland Orchestra, where he worked with Music Director Franz Welser-Möst. Gaffigan is an alumnus of the Aspen Music Festival’s Aspen Conducting Academy and the Tanglewood Music Center.
Passionate about music education and a product of the New York City public school system, Gaffigan grew up in New York City and studied at the LaGuardia High School of Music and Art before pursuing his conducting studies. He believes that access to music education is the method by which America’s concert halls will finally begin to reflect our community and shrink the racial and gender gaps that exist in the performing arts today.
