Omer Meir Wellber

 

Omer Meir Wellber (b. 1981) is one of Israel’s leading conductors of operatic and orchestral repertoire. Music Director of the Teatro Massimo Palermo and Artistic Director of the Toscanini Festival, he has since 2009 served as Music Director of Israel’s Ra’anana Symphonette Orchestra. Wellber is also the incoming Music Director of the Volksoper Wien. He has worked with some of the world’s most prestigious orchestras and is a regular guest conductor at the Israeli Opera.

 

A long-standing association with the Semperoper Dresden culminated in Wellber’s appointment as Principal Guest Conductor between 2018 and 2022. Chief Conductor of the BBC Philharmonic between 2019 and 2022, Wellber gave his inaugural concert at the BBC Proms in July 2019. Other career highlights include serving as Music Director at the Palau de les Arts Reina Sofia in Valencia between 2010 and 2014, and assisting Daniel Barenboim at the Berliner Staatsoper Unter den Linden and Milan’s Teatro alla Scala between 2008 and 2010.

 

Wellber is a Goodwill Ambassador for Save a Child’s Heart, an Israeli-based NGO that provides critical cardiac medical support. He works with various institutions on a range of music outreach programs and is a passionate champion of the emerging generation of Israeli conductors.

 

The Absences of Haim Birkner (Die vier Ohnmachten des Chaim Birkner), Wellber’s first novel, was published by Germany’s Berlin Verlag in 2019, and by Sellerio Editore in Italy in 2021 (Storia vera e non vera di Chaim Birker). The French translation has been published in September 2022 by Éditions du Sous-Sol/Le Seuil. Die Angst, das Risiko und die Liebe - Momente mit Mozart, which explores the emotional context of the three Mozart/Da Ponte operas, was published in Germany in the spring of 2017.

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Novel: Forgiving Cain

Novel: The Absences of Chaim Birkner

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