The multi-talented Mischa Damev is of Franco-Bulgarian descent, and was born in Sofia. He received his first music lessons from his grandfather Michael Lefterov, a famous Bulgarian conductor. When Damev was ten his family moved to Switzerland. In 1986 he completed his piano studies at the Musikhochschule in Basel receiving a soloist diploma before going on to study with Alexis Weissenberg in Paris and Nikita Magaloff in Geneva.
From 1990 to 1999 musician was Artistic Director of the Orpheum International Festival for Young Soloists in Zurich. Between 1992 and 2007 he led the Swiss Lilienberg recital series and the Lilienberg Foundation Art and Culture Division. In 2000 he was appointed trustee of the London International Master Prize Competition for Contemporary Symphonic Music.
On the advice of his mentor Mariss Jansons, in 1991 Mischa Damev switched from his career as a concert pianist to study conducting intensively in Vienna with Karl Österreicher. Following his successful debuts with the Bulgarian National Radio Orchestra and the Sofia Opera House he spent several years working as an assistant to Georges Prêtre and Vladimir Fedoseyev.
Mischa Damev has conducted orchestras such as the Moscow Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra (Permanent Guest Conductor since 1996), the Russian National Orchestra, the Orchestra del Teatro di San Carlo in Naples, the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano Giuseppe Verdi, the Beijing Symphony Orchestra, the Slovak Philharmonic in Bratislava, the Tonkünstler Orchestra, the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome, the Orchestra Sinfonica Siciliana in Palermo, the Orchestra del Teatro la Fenice, the Orchestre du Capitole de Toulouse, the Latvian National Orchestra, the Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg, the Prague Philharmonic and the Orchestra del Teatro alla Scala in Milan among others.
Mischa Damev has recorded with Decca, as well as participating in numerous radio and television productions for Swiss television and Bulgarian and Russian radio and today is a successful record producer (Musiques Suisses).
Since 2006 Mischa Damev and composer Jon Lord (of the rock group Deep Purple) have enjoyed a close working relationship at many European theatres. Since 2011 Damev has conducted in China on a regular basis. In 2007 he was appointed Head of Music of the Directorate of Cultural and Social Affairs of Migros Cooperative Federation in Zurich, where he arranges Swiss tours for a wide variety of internationally renowned orchestras, ensembles and soloists, whilst simultaneously maintaining his successful conducting career.
In February 2014, he performed with the Symphony Orchestra of India at the National Center for the Performing Arts in Beijing. In December 2016 he conducted the BBC Symphony Orchestra, performing the Tchaikovsky’s First Symphony and Andrei Golovin’s Canto d'attesa for violin and orchestra.
Engagements for the current season include a performance with the Münchner Rundfunk Sinfonieorchester in Bad Wörishofen (Germany), concerts with Mischa Maisky and Daniel Lozakovich and a tour with the Tchaikovsky Symphony Orchestra to China.
