Bertie Baigent

Bertie came to international attention as the winner of the Grand Prix, Classical Prize and Symphonic Prize at the International Conducting Competition Rotterdam 2022, following his performance of Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 6 and the world premiere of Joey Roukens’s Night Flight with the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra.

Since then, Bertie has established a strong presence on the international stage with a busy series of debuts and return engagements, including the London Philharmonic Orchestra, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Luxembourg Philharmonic Orchestra, Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra and Bruckner Orchester Linz. In the 2024/25 Season, he made further debuts with the Gulbenkian Orchestra in Lisbon, Orchestra of the Maggio Musicale in Florence and the Osaka Philharmonic Orchestra, working with soloists such as Imogen Cooper and Cédric Tiberghien. In 2025/26, he debuts with the Liège Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and Luxembourg Chamber Orchestra and returns to Glyndebourne and Opera Holland Park.

Also active on the operatic stage, Bertie co-founded and has been Music Director of Waterperry Opera Festival since 2017. There he has conducted acclaimed productions of all the Mozart/Da Ponte operas, as well as The Elixir of Love, Carmen and The Turn of the Screw. He made his Glyndebourne Festival debut in 2023, stepping in at four hours’ notice to conduct The Elixir of Love, and has returned every Season since then. Further opera productions include Semele at Opera Holland Park and his own Paradise Lost, performed to sell-out audiences in London in 2022.

Bertie works regularly in the world of historically informed performance, recently conducting the Orchestra of the Eighteenth Century in performances and radio broadcasts of Clara Schumann’s Piano Concerto. He also directs from the harpsichord for Waterperry’s annual Messiah performances and Bach’s St John Passion, and will direct forthcoming performances of the St Matthew Passion and Mass in B minor.