Born in 1974, American conductor MICHAEL CHRISTIE is much in demand from major orchestras in Europe and North America. In September 2001, he was appointed Chief Conductor of The Queensland Orchestra, the youngest person ever to hold a Chief Conductor post with a major Australian symphony orchestra. One year previously, in September 2000, Mr. Christie was appointed Music Director of the Colorado Music Festival and he has now completed his third highly successful summer in Boulder.

Mr. Christie has already guest conducted many of the leading orchestras in Europe including the Swedish Radio Symphony, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Luxembourg, the Czech Philharmonic, the Netherlands Radio Symphony, the City of Birmingham Symphony, the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, the NDR Orchestra, Hannover, the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse and the Lausanne Chamber Orchestra to name but a few. From 1996 - 1998, he was Associate Conductor of the Helsinki Philharmonic and he has also worked with all the major Finnish orchestras. In North America, Mr. Christie has conducted the Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Atlanta Symphony, the Dallas Symphony, the Minnesota Orchestra, the Indianapolis Symphony, the Vancouver Symphony, the Florida Philharmonic and the Cincinnati Symphony among others.

Mr. Christie has also established an excellent reputation as an opera conductor and each season he conducts both operas and ballet performances at the Opernhaus, Zurich. He has a very special relationship with the House in Zurich where, in the 1997/98 season, he was Assistant Conductor to Franz Welser-Möst (a position especially created for him). That season he made his highly successful debut conducting performances of Romeo & Juliet and a new production of Hansel and Gretel. He has also worked with the Finnish National Opera, where he conducted The Marriage of Figaro in 1999/2000 and with the Queensland Opera where he made his debut conducting Cosí fan tutte the same season. In March 2004 he made his opera debut in The Netherlands conducting John Adams' The Death of Klinghoffer with the Rotterdam Philharmonic to great acclaim.

Michael Christie first came to international attention in 1995 when he was awarded a special prize for "Outstanding Potential" at the First International Sibelius Conductor's Competition in Helsinki. Following the competition, Mr. Christie was invited to become an apprentice conductor with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and subsequently worked with Daniel Barenboim, conducting both in Chicago and at the Berlin State Opera during the 1996/97 season.

Michael Christie graduated from the Oberlin College Conservatory of Music with a bachelor's degree in trumpet performance. His conducting teachers have included Robert Spano, Eiji Oue and Peter Jaffe.