Alex Prior

Alexander Prior (born 5 October 1992) is a British composer and conductor who is the music director of the Eugene Symphony. He studied from the age of 13 to 17 at the Saint Petersburg Conservatory. He was Chief Conductor of the Edmonton Symphony Orchestra from 2017 to 2022, appointed at the age of 23. In September 2022, the Edmonton Symphony and Prior released a video of Ian Tyson’s Four Strong Winds. Alex has also been a champion of music by younger living composers, especially the music of Nicole Lizée, Gabriella Smith, Vivian Fung, and Alissa Cheung. Life and career Prior was born in London to a British father and a Russian-Ukrainian mother, who is a direct descendant of Konstantin Stanislavski. Prior began composing at the age of eight and by his early teens had written 40 works, including symphonies, concertos, two ballets, two operas, and a requiem for the children of Beslan. At an early age, he began piano lessons. He later enrolled in the junior department of the Royal College of Music. At 13, he entered the Saint Petersburg Conservatory where he studied composition with Boris Tishchenko and opera and symphonic conducting with Alexander Alexeev (a pupil of Hans Swarowsky).