Leonard David Wacker is a German conductor and Third Prize winner of the Juventudes Musicales de España International Conducting Competition.
Highlights of the 2026/27 season include the revival of Donizetti's Lucia di Lammermoor at the Opéra de Reims, leading the winter project of the Landesjugendorchester Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, and returning as assistant conductor for the new production of Wagner's Lohengrin at the Teatro Verdi in Trieste.
Previous symphonic assistantships have taken him, among others, to the Staatskapelle Dresden, the Oslo Philharmonic, and the Beethoven Orchester Bonn. In opera, he has worked as assistant conductor at the Deutsche Oper am Rhein in Düsseldorf, the Teatro Verdi in Trieste, and the opera houses of Rennes, Angers, Massy and Nantes, where he made his operatic debut in early 2026. As a guest conductor, he has appeared with the Wiesbaden Symphony Orchestra, the Orquesta Sinfónica de Navarra, the Junge Ensemble Berlin, and the Orquesta Sinfónica de Castilla y León. In May 2026, he travelled to Kharkiv to conduct the Kyiv Camerata in the closing concert of the Kharkiv Music Festival.
A particular interest of Leonard’s artistic work is the music of early twentieth-century modernism as well as the works of Johann Sebastian Bach. To this end, he founded the Ensemble Anthème, with which he performs Baroque cantatas and motets. As a fellow of the Contemporary Conducting Program at the Lucerne Festival, he further developed his work in the field of contemporary music. An essential aspect of his concert programming is illuminating the historical and stylistic connections between musical works.
Leonard Wacker grew up in Jerusalem, Mexico City, and Berlin. He initially studied violin at the Universität der Künste Berlin before pursuing conducting at the Hochschule für Musik Franz Liszt Weimar under Professors Nicolás Pasquet and Ekhart Wycik. During his studies, he spent a semester abroad at the Norwegian Academy of Music in Oslo. In parallel, Leonard studied philosophy and musicology at Humboldt Universität zu Berlin.
He is currently completing his training at the Escuela Superior de Música Reina Sofía in Madrid, where he studies with Professor Nicolás Pasquet, Jordi Francés, and Miguel Ángel Cañamero.
