Anja Bihlmaier
Conductor
Principal guest conductor of the BBC Philharmonic since September 2024, Anja Bihlmaier has become a firm favorite at the BBC Proms, where she appears annually. In 2025-26, she conducts for the first time the London Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal, Zurich Opera Orchestra (at the Tonhalle) and Orchestre National de Lyon, returning to the Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, Madrid National, Helsinki Philharmonic, Berlin Konzerthausorchester, Hong Kong Philharmonic, and Sydney and Melbourne symphonies. She continues her residency at the Bonn Beethovenfest conducting the DSO Berlin, with whom she will also open the Berlin Musikfest. Last season she debuted with the Seattle Symphony, NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra and Munich Philharmonic, all of whom have re-invited her.
Bihlmaier has a wide-ranging repertoire that includes composers ranging from Haydn, Mahler, Strauss and B.A. Zimmermann to Sibelius, Bartók, Dvořák, Shostakovich, Debussy, Britten, Galina Ustvolskaya and Unsuk Chin.
In the past two seasons Bihlmaier conducted new productions at the Berlin Staatsoper (Cassandra) and Glyndebourne Festival (Carmen)—both debuts, and both leading to immediate re-invitations. In spring 2026 she conducts her first production at the Hamburg Staatsoper (Elektra). In her early career she held positions at the opera houses of Hanover, Chemnitz and Kassel, and went on to conduct at the Vienna Volksoper and across Scandinavia, notably in Malmö (Midsummer Night's Dream), Tampere (Der fliegende Holländer) and Oslo (La Traviata).
Bihlmaier was chief conductor of the Residentie Orkest (Den Haag) 2021-2025 and principal guest conductor of the Lahti Sinfonia 2020-2024, and in the past year both orchestras have released CDs with her conducting Ravel with Residentie and Yeol Eum Son for Naïve, and Prokofiev with Christian Poltera for BIS.
Bihlmaier studied at the Freiburg Hochschule für Musik with Scott Sandmeier, was subsequently awarded a scholarship at the Salzburg Mozarteum, and then went on to study with Dennis Russell Davies and Jorge Rotter. She was accepted into the Deutsche Dirigentenforum and received a scholarship from the Brahmsgesellschaft Baden-Baden.
