Versatility, musicality and technical precision, and above all a natural and passionate approach are trademark features of French conductor Ariane Matiakh.

Since the 2022/23 season, Ariane Matiakh has been Chief Conductor of the Württembergische Philharmonie Reutlingen, where she has been continuously developing the orchestra with artistic vision and purpose. Through her stylistic assurance, transparency of sound and the expansion of the orchestra’s international profile, she has left a lasting mark on its artistic development.

Alongside her commitments in Reutlingen, the 2026/27 season will see her conduct new productions of Ariadne auf Naxos at La Monnaie in Brussels, Lucrezia Borgia at the Opéra de Lyon, and Manon Lescaut at the Opéra de Nice. Her concert engagements will take her to international orchestras including the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra London, the George Enescu Philharmonic, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Monte-Carlo, the Malmö Symphony Orchestra, the Duisburg Philharmonic, the Orquesta Sinfónica de Tenerife, the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra, the Filarmonica TR Torino and the Tyrolean Symphony Orchestra Innsbruck. For a new CD production, she returns this season to the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin.

As a guest conductor, Ariane Matiakh regularly works with leading orchestras such as the Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra, the Hallé Orchestra, the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra, the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, the Gürzenich Orchestra Cologne, the Vienna Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre de Paris, the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Dresden Philharmonic, the WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne, the MDR Symphony Orchestra, the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra, the Frankfurt Radio Symphony, the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra, the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Basel Symphony Orchestra, the NDR Radiophilharmonie Hannover, the Orchestre Métropolitain, the Orchestre National du Capitole de Toulouse, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the BBC National Orchestra of Wales.

Ariane Matiakh’s recent opera engagements in the 2025/26 season included a new productions of Janáček’s The Cunning Little Vixen at Stuttgart State Opera, Philippe Leroux’s L’Annonce faite à Marie at the Théâtre du Châtelet, as well as Poulenc’s La Voix humaine and Escaich’s Point d’Orgue at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées. In the 2024/25 season, she made her debut at the Deutsche Oper Berlin with Carmen and at the Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie in Brussels with the world premiere of Mikael Karlsson’s Fanny and Alexander. She also returned to the Royal Opera House Covent Garden for Carmen.

Opera engagements in recent years have included productions at the Stuttgart State Opera, the Hamburg State Opera, the Norwegian National Opera (Carmen), the Royal Opera House (La bohème), the Komische Oper Berlin (Le nozze di Figaro), Gothenburg Opera (Madama Butterfly), the Opéra de Nice (Die Zauberflöte), Oper Halle (Tosca) and the Opéra national du Rhin in Strasbourg (Werther, Samson et Dalila, La voix humaine) and others.

Ariane Matiakh’s discography includes a Grammy nomination for her Capriccio recording of both piano concertos by Zara Levina with the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra. For the Capriccio label, she has also recorded the works of Johanna Doderer as well as a CD with music by Francis Poulenc and Jean Françaix. As part of a further collaboration with the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra, she recorded works by Harald Genzmer, Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari and Richard Strauss. Berlin Classics released a recording with piano concertos by Clara Schumann and Ludwig van Beethoven, performed by Ragna Schirmer and the Staatskapelle Halle.

Her work dedicated on Charles Koechlin’s music with the Sinfonieorchester Basel and the Württembergische Philharmonie was praised by the press (Choc Classica, Preis der deutschen Schallplattenkritik etc.)

In recognition of her achievements in French musical life and her role as an ambassador of French culture abroad, Ariane Matiakh was appointed an “Officier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres” in 2022.

The daughter of two opera singers, she grew up in an exceptionally musical environment and learnt to play the piano at an early age. Later, she studied orchestral conducting in Vienna, where she also sang in the renowned Arnold Schoenberg Choir under conductors including Nikolaus Harnoncourt and Adam Fischer. Particularly formative experiences during her comprehensive training include the time she spent studying with Leopold Hager, Yuji Yuasa, and Seiji Ozawa.

Ariane Matiakh’s first appointment as Assistant Conductor in an opera house was at the Opéra et Orchestre de Montpellier, where she worked closely together with James Conlon, Armin Jordan, Emmanuel Krivine and Alain Altinoglu, among others.