Bogdan Roscic of Belgrade appointed head of Vienna State Opera

Belgrade-born Bogdan Roscic has been appointed new director of the Vienna State Opera. Roscic, currently the director of Sony Music Classical in New York, will be running the Vienna State Opera in the 2020/21 season. Former head of the Austrian radio Oe3 will thereby succeed Dominique Meyer, whose contract expires in 2020.

Austria's Minister of Culture Thomas Drozda explained his decision by saying that Roscic has great contacts with the most eminent singers and conductors in the world.

– I want to use this opportunity and position the Opera as the new leading institution in our culture from 2020 – the minister said and added that Roscic's appointment also meant bringing young blood into the opera's management.

Roscis (52) said that the decision to accept the invitation had been the most important one he had made in his life, but also one of the easiest, as he was attracted by the freedom he would have. He said at the press conference that the “death” of Opera, announced for decades, hadn't happened, but that the genre had lost its importance and that his wish was therefore to bring the audience back above all.

Bogdan Roscic was born in Belgrade, and his parents moved to Austria in 1974. They initially lived in Linz, where he finished school. He later studied philosophy and music at the University of Vienna. He started his career as a journalist at the cultural section of Die Presse, before moving to Kurier in 1991. Two years later, he moved to the national radio station Oe3, becoming the head of the station in 1996. During the period of his running the station, Oe3 built an image of the leading station, focusing on pop music. He then worked at Universal Music Austria, followed by his moving to Hamburg in 2003, where he ran Deutsche Grammophon and Hyperlink. His next engagement was at London's Decca. Three years later, he became the director of Sony Music Classical in New York.

Bogdan Roscic

Vienna State Opera

Sony Masterworks

Thomas Drozda

Ministry of Culture of Austria

Dominique Meyer

Oe3 radio

Die Presse Kurier

journalist

journalism

radio journalist

Universal Music Austria

Hamburg

Vienna

Deutsche Grammophon

Hyperlink

Decca

London

New York