Born in Moscow in 1945, Michail Jurowski is the son of the composer Wladimir Jurowski and grandson of the conductor David Block. His sons Vladimir and Dmitri are also internationally renowned conductors. Michail Jurowski grew up in the circle of internationally acclaimed artists of the former Soviet Union such as Ojstrach, Rostropovitch, Kogan, Gilels, and Chatchaturjan. Dmitri Shostakovich was a close family friend and he and Michail not only spoke often but would also play four-hand piano pieces together. Such experiences had a huge influence on the young musician and it is therefore no coincidence that today Michail Jurowski is one of the leading interpreters of Shostakovich’s music. In 2012 Michail Jurowski was awarded the third International Shostakovich Prize by the Shostakovich Gohrisch Foundation. Michail Jurowski was educated at the Moscow Conservatoire, where he studied conducting under Leo Ginsburg and music science under Alexei Kandinsky. During his studies he assisted Gennady Rozhdestvensky at the National Radio and Television Symphony Orchestra of Moscow. While still a resident in Russia he conducted the Music Theatre of Stanislavski and Nemirovich-Danchenko in Moscow and during his last years in the Soviet Union frequently conducted performances at the Bolshoi Theatre. From 1978 Michail Jurowski was regular guest conductor at the Komische Oper Berlin and in 1989 he left the USSR with his family and was offered a permanent post with the Dresden Semperoper. Other titled positions have included: General Music Director and Chief Conductor of the Northwest German Philharmonic Orchestra; Chief Conductor of Leipzig Opera; Chief Conductor of WDR Rundfunkorchester in Cologne; Principal Guest Conductor of the Tonkünstler Orchestra of Lower Austria. As a guest conductor Michail Jurowski has led the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra, Leipzig Gewandhaus, Dresden Philharmonic, Staatskapelle Dresden, Oslo Philharmonic, Bergen Philharmonic, Orquestra Sinfónica do Porta Casa da Música, São Paulo Symphony and Stavanger Symphony orchestras among others. In addition he works with the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra at least twice a year. Recent highlights have included his debuts with the London, Warsaw and St Petersburg philharmonic orchestras. He also conducted the Dresden Staatskapelle at the International Shostakovich Festival in Gohrisch, Orquesta Sinfónica de Galicia, Lübeck Philharmonic, Dresden Philharmonic’s New Year’s concerts, the Tonkünstler Orchestra of Lower Austria, the Norwegian Opera Orchestra and the Monte Carlo Philharmonic, in addition to his regular guest conducting weeks at Norrköping and Stavanger symphony orchestras and a revival of the lauded Romeo and Juliet with the Zurich Opera. The 14/15 season will see Michail return to the Bolshoi to conduct another run of Fiery Angel as well as The Queen of Spades and he will also lead the State Academic Symphony Orchestra at the Viktor Sedov Memorial concert. His other ballet and opera engagements include Eugene Onegin at the Grand Théâtre de Genève, the Czar’s Bride at Cité de la Musique in Paris and Romeo and Juliet at the Opernhaus Zürich. He will also return to conduct the St Petersburg Philharmonic Orchestra, Janáček Philharmonic Orchestra, Orquestra Sinfonica do Porto, Flanders Opera’s New Year’s concerts, Tirol Symphony Orchestra Innsbruck, Royal Danish Orchestra and Orquesta Sinfonica de Galicia. Besides televised concerts and radio recordings in Stuttgart, Cologne, Dresden, Oslo, Norrköping, Hannover and Berlin, Maestro Jurowski has recorded with L'Orchestre de la Suisse Romande and has conducted various CD recordings; including film music, Shostakovich’s opera The Gamblers, Shostakovich’s entire vocal symphonic pieces, Rimsky-Korsakov’s opera Christmas Eve, as well as orchestral pieces by Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev, Reznicek, Meyerbeer, Lehár, Kálmán, Nicolai, Rangström, Pettersen-Berger, Grieg, Svensen, Kantcheli and many others.
In 1992 and 1996 Jurowski won the German Record Critics' Prize and in 2001 he received a Grammy nomination for 3 CD productions of Orchestral Music by Rimsky-Korsakov with the RSB Orchestra.