Nagano begins his much-anticipated tenure as the Montreal Symphony's music director in 2006. He led the orchestra this week in its first concerts since the end of a five-month musicians' strike.

Born in Berkeley, California, Nagano studied sociology and music at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and composition at San Francisco State University. Since 1978, he has been music director of the Berkeley Symphony. He was music director of the Op_ra National de Lyon and the Halle Orchestra in the 1990s and is currently artistic director and principal conductor of the Deutsches Sinfonie-Orchester Berlin and music director of Los Angeles Opera. He will give up both posts next year, when he takes up his Montreal position and succeeds Zubin Mehta as music director of the Bavarian State Opera in Munich.