Alexander Mikhailovich Raskatov |

Alexander Raskatov

Composer Alexander Raskatov was born in Moscow. In 1978 he graduated from the Moscow Conservatory with a degree in composition (class of Albert Lehmann).

Since 1979 he has been a member of the Union of Composers, since 1990 he has been a member of the Russian Association of Contemporary Music and a staff composer at the Stetson University (USA). In 1994, at the invitation of the M.P. Belyaev” moved to Germany, since 2007 he lives in Paris.

Has received orders from the Mariinsky Theater Orchestra, the Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra, the Basel Symphony Orchestra (conductor Dennis Russell Davies), the Dallas Symphony Orchestra (conductor Jaap van Zveden), the London Philharmonic Orchestra (conductor Vladimir Yurovsky), the Asco-Schoenberg Ensemble (Amsterdam), Hilliards Ensemble (London).

In 1998 Raskatov was awarded the Main Composer Prize of the Salzburg Easter Festival. In 2002, the disc After Mozart, which included a play by Raskatov performed by Gidon Kremer and the Kremerata Baltica Orchestra, won a Grammy Award. The composer’s discography includes recordings by Nonesuch (USA), EMI (Great Britain), BIS (Sweden), Wergo (Germany), ESM (Germany), Megadisc (Belgium), Chant du monde (France), Claves (Switzerland).

In 2004, Dutch Television produced a special television film about Raskatov’s Path concerto for viola and orchestra performed by Yuri Bashmet and the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by Valery Gergiev.

In 2008, commissioned by the Netherlands National Opera, Raskatov composed the opera Heart of a Dog. The opera has been presented 8 times in Amsterdam and 7 times in London (English National Opera). In March 2013 the opera will be performed at La Scala under the direction of Valery Gergiev.