Marcus Merkel

Born in Berlin, Marcus Merkel studied conducting, composition, piano and singing in Berlin. In his youth he was also trained as a jazz pianist and singer, as well as on the double bass and saxophone. Among other things, he won the German National Composition Competition four times and most recently the competition for the Festival Fanfare of the Graz University of Technology. He attended courses with Gianluigi Gelmetti, among others, and was a guest student of Christian Thielemann in Bayreuth. Marcus Merkel founded the Junge Philharmonie Berlin while still a student and is its artistic director. During this time, he also conducted a festival in Kyoto, Japan, led a conducting workshop for the Berlin Philharmonic's education department, and filled in for Julien Salemkour in a production of