Clelia Cafiero

The Neapolitan conductor Clelia Cafiero gained international attention with her acclaimed debut at the Chorégies d'Orange in the summer of 2023, where she conducted Carmen with the Orchestre National de Lyon conducted, and in April 2025 through a much-noticed short-term stand-in at the Opéra de Paris with the French version of Don Carlos.

The 2025/26 season is marked by numerous prestigious debuts. She makes her Australian debut at Opera Australia with Carmen, and will appear for the first time at the Staatsoper Berlin (La Bohème) and the Semperoper Dresden (La Traviata). She also returns to the English National Opera to conduct Carmen as well as a concert program.

Her international presence on the concert stage continues to grow impressively: she makes her debuts with the Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano, the Orchestre National de France, the BBC National Orchestra of Wales, the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra, the Malmö Symphony Orchestra, the La Monnaie Symphony Orchestra, and the Lucerne Symphony Orchestra. She also returns to the Orchestre national Montpellier Occitanie for a series of concerts.

Already in the 2024/25 season, Clelia Cafiero made further significant opera debuts at the English National Opera (La Bohème), the Opéra Royal de Wallonie in Liège (La Périchole), the Cincinnati Opera (Tosca), and with the Nikikai Opera Foundation in Tokyo (Così fan tutte). Her symphonic debuts that season included appearances with the Orchestre National de Lyon, the Irish National Orchestra, and the Festival Napa Valley.

From 2022 to 2025, Cafiero served as Principal Guest Conductor of the Opéra de Tours, where she led both opera productions and symphonic concerts.

In recent years, she has conducted Madama Butterfly at the Opéra de Québec, Carmen and La Traviata at the Opéra de Marseille, Tosca at the Angers-Nantes Opéra and the Opéra de Rennes, and Il barbiere di Siviglia at the Opéra de Tours. She has also appeared in concert with the Gulbenkian Orchestra, the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre National de Lorraine, and the Orchestra of the Accademia della Scala. She returned to the Chorégies d’Orange to conduct Tosca, and made her debut at the Festival Radio France with Rossini’s Stabat Mater.

Clelia Cafiero began her musical career as a concert pianist and has performed in renowned halls such as the Concertgebouw, Carnegie Hall, the Royal Albert Hall and the Philharmonie de Paris. Between 2013 and 2019, she worked regularly as a répétiteur at the Teatro alla Scala. She studied piano and conducting at the conservatories in Naples and Milan, as well as at the Mozarteum in Salzburg. She also holds a master's degree in philosophy from the University of Naples – Federico II.