CAREER

At 18, Gary Brain was awarded a scholarship to study in Berlin, Germany, at the Staatliche Hochschule für Musik. He studied conducting, piano, cello, timpani and percussion with the principal timpanist of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, composition with Boris Blacher and all general music subjects.

He obtained a B. Mus. (bachelor of music) from Indiana University, USA, and went on to take up a position in the BBC Training Orchestra in Bristol, UK.

Gary Brain played with the BBC Welsh and Ulster Orchestras before being timpanist of the “Royal Opera House Covent Garden Orchestra” in London.

Gary Brain was offered a high-level fellowship to study conducting at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique in Paris.

He studied conducting privately with Rafael Kubelik for four years and attended master classes given by Lorin Maazel (little knowing he would record commercially with Maestro Maazel’s brother-in-law Ingolf Turban later in his career).

After years of hard work, he was made an assistant to the Ensemble Intercontemporain of Pierre Boulez in Paris, attached to David Robertson the then music director.

His breakthrough came when he was given his first concert with the Paris Opera at the Festival of Saint-Florent-Le-Vieil. This concert was later repeated in Paris.

Gary was then asked to record Rossini’s Petite Messe Solennelle live by Carlton Records.

Gary Brain recorded works by Harold Truscott for Naxos/Marco Polo with National Symphony Orchestra of Ireland in Dublin to critical acclaim. One particularly known severe London critic, Callum MacDonald, wrote in TEMPO: “Gary Brain drew playing of searing white-hot intensity from his orchestra”.

This led him to conduct the Philharmonia Orchestra in London in a series of world premiere recordings of the complete orchestral works by Polish composer Czeslaw Marek, a student of Mahler for Koch Records.

The first CD in this series won Gary the German Grammy-Echo award for conducting “The Best Orchestral CD of the Year” in 1997, against such competition as Claudio Abbado with the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra or Sir Simon Rattle with the City of Birmingham Orchestra.

Gary was then invited to record Henry Collet’s Concertos Flamencos with the Royal Orchestra of Seville in Spain for Claves records.

BMG then asked him to record works by Russian composer Ippolitov-Ivanov with the Bamberg Orchestra in Germany.

Gary Brain also recorded a series of world premiere recordings of works by Josef Myslivecek (1737-1781), a great friend of Mozart, for Toccata Classics, in Kazakhstan.

Gary’s new career has led him to conduct concerts with major European orchestras in London, Paris, all over Germany, Spain, Italy, Finland, Norway, Iceland, Sweden, Russia, Austria, Slovenia, Romania, Poland, the Czech Republic, including invitations to conduct Philharmonia Orchestra at the Aldeburgh and Chichester Festivals.