Niels Muus

**2013 - 2023**: Professor and Director of the Opera Masters Program at the Music and Arts University of the City of Vienna.

**Music Director and Professor of Opera** at the Central Academy of Drama (Zhong Xi) Beijing.

Niels Muus received his musical education at the Royal Danish Academy of Music, studying under Franco Ferrara, Jakob Gimpel, Tatjana Nikolayeva, and Carlo Zecchi. From 1992 to 1999, he served as First Kapellmeister at the Tyrolean State Theatre in Innsbruck, where he not only maintained the Italian opera repertoire but also garnered international attention for reviving works such as Carl Nielsen's "Maskarade" and Rued Langgaard's "Antikrist". He then became a conductor and casting director at the Vienna Volksoper, where he worked for four years, discovering and nurturing many young singers who are now among the leading generation of vocalists.

Internationally, he has conducted at renowned concert halls such as the Berlin Philharmonie, the Gewandhaus in Leipzig, Tokyo Opera City, and the Accademia di Santa Cecilia in Rome. A specialist in the Viennese operetta tradition, Niels Muus has conducted the traditional New Year's concerts for Salute to Vienna in major American concert halls for the past ten years. As an accompanist, he has achieved great success at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris and the Wigmore Hall in London.

Since 2016, he has been the Artistic Director of the opera project for the Vienna Philharmonic's Summer Academy. Since 2019, Niels Muus has also been the Music Director and Professor of Opera at the Central Academy of Drama (Zhong Xi) in Beijing.

In addition to his deep connection with the Viennese tradition, Niels Muus is also a specialist in the Italian opera repertoire. The international highlights of his career include performances of "L'elisir d'amore" (Macerata Opera Festival, Seoul), "L'Assedio di Corinto" (Corinth – Culture Olympiad), "Aida" (Beijing, Reggio Calabria), "Rusalka" (Moscow, Aarhus), "Die Fledermaus" (Moscow, Tokyo), "Die lustige Witwe" (Messina), "Otello" (Ankara), "Falstaff" (Rovigo, Trento, Bolzano), "Macbeth" (Jesi, Fermo), "Il cappello di paglia" (Messina), "Le nozze di Figaro", "Don Giovanni" (San Francisco), "La Clemenza di Tito" (Oberlin), "Die Zauberflöte" (Macau), and "Satyricon" (Darmstadt).

Niels Muus has received numerous international awards for his work: the "Critic’s Pick" from the New York Times for the recording of Gaetano Donizetti's "L'elisir d'amore", the "Critic’s Choice" from Gramophone Magazine and the Radio Prize from Danmarks Radio for Rued Langgaard's "Antikrist", and a nomination for the German Record Critics' Award for "La Pastorella" (with Akiko Nakajima and Peter Schmidl). In 2016, Niels Muus was also nominated for the prestigious American Pulitzer Prize for the CD "Judith Zaimont: Symphony no. 4".

His DVDs and CDs are available on the following labels:
- Deutsche Grammophon
- Denon
- Arthaus Musik
- TDK-RAI
- Preiser Records Vienna
- Gramola
- Sorel Records New York