René Gulikers, conductor

René Gulikers studied orchestral conducting at the Music Conservatoire in Maastricht (The Netherlands). He attended several conducting courses in Holland and abroad, e.g. in Salzburg (Austria) in 1985, where he studied with Ferdinand Leitner and won the first prize for young conductors. In 1992 he won one of the Telecom-prizes in Besançon (France).

Many invitations followed: he conducted the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra in the Festival "Moscow Modern 1992" and orchestras in Chile, South Korea and Japan. Gulikers was invited to conduct the BACH chamber orchestra from Jekaterinaburg, the Ural State Philharmonic Orchestra, the Philharmonic Orchestra from Nizhny Novgorod and the Russian State Academic Symphony Orchestra (2006), all from Russia. Since 1997 he has conducted the Slovenian Radio and Television Orchestra and the Slovene Philharmonic Orchestra (a.o. in the World Music Days 2003) many times. From 2005 he is a yearly guest with the National Symphony Orchestra of Chile. In his own country he conducted the leading orchestras, such as the Netherlands Philharmonic Orchestra and the Netherlands Chamber Orchestra. Furthermore he has conducted contemporary operas in Germany and the Netherlands.

From 1988 to 2004 he was artistic director of the Dutch Ensemble '88 for contemporary music. Since its foundation the Ensemble has given innumerable concerts (and radio recordings) both at home and abroad. Since 2004, René Gulikers has been the principal conductor of the Wire Works Ensemble and since 2006 of the Ensemble 21, both in Germany.

From 1988 until 1990 Gulikers taught orchestral conducting at the Maastricht conservatoire. In addition he has been teaching at the music academy in Münster (Germany) since 1994 and from October 2005 he has been appointed professor at the music academy in Hamburg (Germany).