For decades Justus Frantz has been a formative figure in musical life as
an internationally successful pianist, as a conductor of outstanding orchestras, as a presenter and tireless music mediator, as a visionary of classical music life and as the founder in particular of the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival and the Philharmonie der Nationen. With his devotion to music and his enthusiasm, he is an ambassador for the classical musical heritage of Central Europe and especially Germany to the world.
Frantz was born in Hohensalza what is today Poland and grew up in Testorf in eastern Holstein. While studying piano with Eliza Hansen in Hamburg and Wilhelm Kempff in Positano, Justus Frantz studied conducting with Wilhelm Brückner-Rüggeberg. He won the attention of a large audience as a prize-winner at the ARD International Music Competition in Munich in 1967.
When Herbert von Karajan engaged the young pianist in 1970, he achieved his international breakthrough. Tours with the Berlin Philharmonic, the Vienna Philharmonic, the Orchestre de Paris and the Czech Philharmonic through France, Germany and Austria as well as appearances at the Salzburg Festival followed. Performances with Leonard Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic in the USA in 1975 established the creative friendship between Justus Frantz and the American composer and conductor. In 1986 Justus Frantz founded the Schleswig-Holstein Music Festival and was its artistic
director for many years. He has made it one of the most important
festivals in Europe and created a format that has become the model for
numerous other festival foundations.
Justus Frantz has repeatedly developed unconventional concepts to win
new audiences for the music and to enable unbiased encounters with the
music. For ten years he directed and hosted the successful television
show “Achtung! Klassik”, for which he was awarded the Golden Camera in 1993.
Justus Frantz is the artistic director of the Philharmonie der Nationen,
which he founded in 1995 and was co-inspired by Leonard Bernstein
and Yehudi Menuhin. With this orchestra he has performed in more than
1000 concerts – always with the aim of not only making excellent music,
but also symbolically promoting the peaceful coexistence of people. For
example, he conducted at the United Nations General Assembly Hall in
New York in front of eighty heads of state, at the benefit concert
“Michael Jackson and Friends” in Munich & Olympic Stadium or at an
exclusive concert for Pope John Paul II.
Justus Frantz regularly works with renowned orchestras and opera
houses around the world, such as the Orchestra of the Mariinsky Theatre
St. Petersburg, the China Philharmonic Orchestra, the Vienna
Philharmonic Orchestra, the Japan Philharmonic Orchestra, the Beijing
Symphony Orchestra, the Novaya Rossiya Orchestra, the Great
Symphony Orchestra Moscow, the London Philharmonic, the Royal
Philharmonic Orchestra London, the KZN Philharmonic Orchestra in
Durban and the Sinfonia Varsovia.
In 2013, Justus Frantz became the first Christian German artist to be
given the state position of principal conductor of an Israeli orchestra at
the Israel Sinfonietta. With a major Brahms festival in Israel in 2014, the
Hamburg-based conductor not only fulfilled a musical dream, but also
built a symbolic bridge to his homeland.
His annual “Finca Festival Frantz & Friends” on Gran Canaria has been
one of the “insider tips” of international musical life for years.
Renowned soloists and conductors, not only the Philarmonie der
Nationen, but also other world-class orchestras meet annually in an
informal atmosphere for joint concerts.
At the end of the Cold War, Justus Frantz and Valery Gergiev founded
the German-Soviet Philharmonic Orchestra as a symbol of the New Era
for détente.
Justus Frantz has been decorated with prestigious awards, such as
Bambi, Grammy, Golden Camera etc.
