The MusikTheater an der Wien is saddened to hear of the death of conductor Michael Boder. He died in Vienna on 7 April at the age of 65. He was dedicated to modern and contemporary music theatre like no other and was particularly successful in Vienna. At our theatre, with which he had been closely associated for many years, Michael Boder was currently rehearsing the project Freitag, der Dreizehnte, which he helped to conceive in honour of the composer Arnold Schönberg. At the Theater an der Wien, he conducted new productions of Igor Stravinsky's The Rake's Progress, Franz Schubert's Lazarus, Gottfried von Einem's The Visit of the Old Lady, the world premieres of Anno Schreier's Hamlet and Christian Jost's Egmont as well as the opening concert of the 2011/12 season. Michael Boder was a tireless and passionate advocate of 20th and 21st century music and conducted world premieres of works by Georg Friedrich Haas, Friedrich Cerha, Hans Werner Henze, Krzysztof Penderecki, Manfred Trojahn and Aribert Reimann, among others. The sudden death of this highly esteemed colleague and artist leaves a painful void and is a great loss for the MusikTheater an der Wien and the world of music. Our thoughts and deepest sympathy are with Michael Boder's partner and his beloved family.

Stefan Herheim, director and artistic director of the MusikTheater an der Wien: "During our first collaboration - Alban Berg's Lulu in 2010 - I got to know Michael as an artist whose satisfaction depended on whether he was able to get the best out of his counterpart. Michael's heart beat for this artistic interplay until the very last beat. Rest gently, dear friend."

Michael Boder was born in Darmstadt in 1958 and completed his studies in Hamburg and Florence. He began his career as assistant to Michael Gielen at the Frankfurt Opera and soon began conducting himself in Munich, Zurich, Hamburg and Berlin. At the age of 29, he became music director of the opera in Basel. He held the post of music director at the Gran Teatre del Liceu Barcelona from 2008 to 2012, after which he was chief conductor of Det Kongelige Teater Copenhagen until 2016. In recent decades, Michael Boder has been a regular guest at the Theater an der Wien. Michael Boder has also been associated with the Vienna State Opera and the theatres in Berlin, Dresden, Tokyo, San Francisco, Brussels and Milan. In addition to his broad repertoire of Wagner, R. Strauss, Bruckner, Mahler, Berg and Schönberg, he was particularly interested in the music of the 20th and 21st centuries. He has realised numerous first and world premieres by composers such as Henze, Reimann, Penderecki, Trojahn and many others.