Sir Mark Elder is music director of the Hallé Orchestra and regularly works with the leading symphony orchestras of the world. In Great Britain he enjoys close associations with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment. He was music director of English National Opera from 1979 to 1993, and was principal guest conductor of the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra. He has appeared annually at the BBC Proms in London, since 2003 with the Hallé Orchestra, and in 1987 and 2006 he conducted the globally televised Last Night of the Proms. He regularly appears at many of the most famous international opera houses, e.g. the Royal Opera House, the Metropolitan Opera, the Opéra National de Paris, the Lyric Opera of Chicago, the Glyndebourne Festival, and also he was the first British conductor to conduct a new production at the Bayreuth Festival. Sir Mark Elder has made many recordings with orchestras like the Hallé (on the Hallé's own label), the London Philharmonic Orchestra, the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, the BBC Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the Royal Opera House Orchestra and the English National Opera Orchestra. Past and future conducting engagements feature the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, the Munich Philharmonic Orchestra, the London Philharmonic, the London Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, the Chicago Symphony, the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Royal Opera House and the New York Met. Sir Mark Elder was knighted in 2008 and made the Commander of the British Empire in 1989. In May 2006, he was named conductor of the year by the Royal Philharmonic Society.

Liuba Sokolova won the International Singing Competition in Perm in 1997. Born in Chelyabinsk in the Urals in 1962, she graduated from the Rimsky Korsakov Conservatory of St Petersburg in 1993, after which she continued her studies until 1995. In 1993 she joined the Mariinsky Theatre, and toured a great deal in Europe, the USA and Japan with the theatre ensemble. She has performed roles at top opera houses like La Scala Milan, the Royal Opera House, the Metropolitan Opera New York and many others. Her discography includes the following recordings: Salome, Ivan the Terrible, The Tsar's Bride (under Valery Gergiev on Philips Classic).

Sorin Coliban was born in Bucharest and studied at the city's academy of music, where he sang Bluebeard in Bartók's Duke Bluebeard's Castle and Figaro among other roles until graduating in 1995. His career began in 1996 as Don Giovanni (staging: Ruggero Raimondi) in Athens Megaro Mousikis. In the following years he received invitations to the Royal Opera House, Opéra Bastille in Paris, Garnier and Châtelet, San Francisco (1999), Santiago de Chile, Tel Aviv (2002), the Rossini Festival in Pesaro, Opéra Monte-Carlo, Bavarian State Opera in Munich (2005), Deutsche Oper am Rhein in Düsseldorf, Klagenfurt Theatre, to Lucerne (2004), the Vienna Festwochen and the Vienna State Opera and Volksoper (2005) as well as Basel Theatre (2007). His repertoire embraces roles like Philip II (Don Carlos), Fiesco (Simon Boccanegra), Procida (Les vêpres siciliennes), Raimondo (Lucia di Lammermoor), Ferrando (Il trovatore), Banquo (Macbeth), Don Giovanni and Il Commendatore (Don Giovanni), Capulet (Roméo et Juliette), Escamillo (Carmen), Colline (La Bohème), Sarastro (The Magic Flute), Mose, Don Magnifico (La Cenerentola), the Dutchman and Macbeth (Macbeth by Sciarrino). As a concert singer Sorin Coliban has sung in works by Mendelssohn (Elijah), Bach (St Matthew Passion), Verdi (Requiem), Mahler (8th Symphony, Pater Profundus), Beethoven (9th Symphony), performing in Bucharest, Tel Aviv, Lyon and Dresden. Since 2004 he has been a member of the ensemble of the Vienna Volksoper and State Opera, where he has appeared in the following roles: Archelaos Zemlinsky's (Der König Kandaules), Il Commendatore (Don Giovanni), Uncle Bonze (Madama Butterfly), Müller (Irrelohe), Zuniga (Carmen) as well as the Speaker of the Temple (The Magic Flute), Bartolo (Marriage of Figaro), Friedrich Engel (Der Evangelimann) and Konrad Nachtigall (Meistersinger von Nürnberg), Timur in the new production of Turandot, Eremit in the new production of Der Freischütz, the Farmer in the new production of Orff's Die Kluge, Tommaso in the new production of Tiefland by D´Albert, Basilio in the new production of Il barbiere di Siviglia, Fra Melitone in La forza del destino as well as Capulet in Romeo et Juliette. In 2007 Coliban sang Sarastro in the new production of The Magic Flute at the Mozart Festival La Coruna in Spain. One year later he sang Il Commendatore in Mozart's Don Giovanni at the Festwochen in Gmunden. In 2009 he will be making his his debut at the Bregenz Festival as Ramphis in Aida. In the seasons to come Sorin Coliban's distinctive and powerful voice will be heard in a broad range of roles at the Vienna State Opera.

Will Hartmann studied at the Musikhochschule in Cologne and has won prizes at several well reputed singing competitions. He began his career as a lyric baritone, taking up an engagement in the Opera Studio at Cologne Opera in 1991 and becoming a member of the ensembles there in 1993. Then from 1996 to 2006 he was a member of the ensemble of the State Opera in Hannover. Will Hartmann's first successful sorties into tenor territory date to summer 1998 when he made his debut at the Royal Opera House in London as Da-Ud in concert performances of Richard Strauss's opera Die ägyptische Helena under Christian Thielemann. The official changeover to tenor came in 2000, whereupon he made debuts in a number of roles at the State Opera in Hanover. His debuts as Pelléas and Alfredo were internationally acclaimed. At Graz Opera in 2001 he made his debut as Lensky under Philippe Jordan. In 2002 he sang Macduff at the Royal Opera House in London and also sang Tamino in a new production of The Magic Flute there in early 2003 under Sir Colin Davis. His debut at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich followed in 2002 (Jenik) and his Vienna State Opera debut in 2004 (Tamino). He performed as Pelléas at the Vienna Festwochen and the Edinburgh Festival. His performance as Froh in the new production of The Ring at the Royal Opera House in London (Warner/Pappano) in late 2004 was judged a great success. In summer 2006 he made a highly impressive debut as Loge in a new production of The Rhinegold by Graham Vick at the Teatro Sao Carlos in Lisbon. In the same year he attracted attention with his interpretation of Don José in a new Carmen production by Sebastian Nübling at the State Theatre in Stuttgart. In 2007, Hartmann made his Deutsche Oper Berlin debut in the role of Max followed by his Berlin State Opera debut in the same role a short time later. In summer 2008 he was involved in a revival of the legendary Freischütz staging of Achim Freyer at Stuttgart State Opera. Guest appearances have taken him in recent years to Leipzig, Dresden, Rome, Paris, Madrid and Athens as well as to the Festival in Orange. He has been performed in radio and television broadcasts under conductors like G. Sinopoli, M. Janowski, M. Honeck and S. Cambreling. Most recently Will Hartmann appeared as Don José at the Royal Opera House, as Matteo at the Munich Opera Festival, as Melot in Tristan (Chéreau/Barenboim) and as Daniló in Die lustige Witwe, both at La Scala Milan.

Among the roles John Graham-Hall has sung are Mozart's Basilio, Monostatos, the Dancing Master in Ariadne auf Naxos, Lysander in A Midsummer Night's Dream, Schuysky in Boris Godunov, Sapkin in From the House of the Dead, Triquet, Herod in Salome, the School Master in The Cunning Little Vixen, Sylvester in The Silver Tassie, Edmondo in Manon Lescaut, Mime in The Ring, Anatole in War and Peace, Sellem in The Rake's Progress, Alwa in Lulu, the Doctor in The Handmaid`s Tale, Vitek in The Makropoulos Case (English National Opera), Albert Herring (Covent Garden, Glyndebourne), Tikhon in Katya Kabanova (Lyon), Kudrjás in Katya Kabanova, Bob Boles in Peter Grimes (Glyndebourne, Paris, Amsterdam, Salzburg and Berlin), Basilio, Ferrando, Aschenbach (Glyndebourne Touring Opera), Bob Boles, Achilles in King Priam (Antwerp), Lensky (Lyon, Toronto), Cassio (Welsh National Opera, Lisbon), Shapkin (Nice), Lysander (Paris, Lyon, Rome, Aix), Basilio, the Dancing Master (Royal Opera House), the title role in Dusapin's Perela (Bastille, world premiere) and Dada in Nyman's Man and Boy (Almeida Opera). Current and future engagements include Michel in Julietta and the Madman in Wozzeck (Bastille) as well as Podesta in La finta giardiniera (Salzburg), Aschenbach in Death in Venice, Tikhon, Basilio and Sellem (La Monnaie), Le Médecin in The Fall of the House of Usher (Bregenz Festival), Basilio and Monostatos (Covent Garden), Mayor and Abrenuccio, Love and Other Demons (Glyndebourne) and Basilio, Herod and the Dancing Master in new recordings for Chandos.

Włodzimierz Siedlik graduated from the Academy of Music in Krakow (diploma with the highest distinction), the Liturgical Institute of the Papal Academy of Theology in Krakow (diploma with distinction) as well as the Academy of Music in Bydgoszcz (diploma with distinction). From 1990 to 1992 he was a laureate of the Polish Competition Choirmasters in Poznań and the director of the Paderewski Centre in Tarnów. In 1991 he established the Chamber Orchestra in Tarnów and was a director of the Association of State Music Schools in Tarnów from 1992 to 1996. Since 1994 he has worked as a lecturer at the Liturgical Institute of the Papal Academy of Theology in Krakow. As a choral conductor with choirs such as Cantus, Psalmodia, Jagiellonian’s University Masculine Choir, he has won Polish and foreign awards; in 2001, for instance, he was awarded the Jerzy Kurczewski Prize for outstanding achievements in choral music under the honorary patronage of Krzysztof Penderecki. Since 1995 he has been the Director and Artistic Manager of the Polish Radio Choir.

Anna Szostak is one of the leading choral conductors in Poland. She has founded several vocal groups, including Camerata Silesia (in 1990) of which she remains the artistic director. From the outset she has aspired to achieve technical perfection and creativity. In selecting repertoire and an interpretational approach, she focuses on period performance of works of the Renaissance and the Baroque. She has been involved in memorable collaborations with the well known early music singers Emma Kirkby and Barbara Schlick and with major ensembles such as Il Tempo i Concerto Polacco, the Silesian Chamber Orchestra, and the Chamber Orchestra of the Polish Radio National Orchestra. Anna Szostak has conducted Camerata Silesia in large-scale works like the Christmas Oratorio of J. S. Bach and in smaller, a cappella concerts with instrumental soloists, for instance the Miserere of Witold Szalonek and Arvo Pärt as well as the psalms for choir and band Aus der Tiefe rufe ich dich, o Herr by Krzysztof Knittel, performed at the Warsaw Autumn Festival in 2000. Her conducting repertoire also includes purely orchestral works (e.g. symphonies of W.A. Mozart) and she has a particular interest in modern music, above all Trois poèmes d’Henri Michaux by Witold Lutosławski, whose work Anna Szostak conducted with Antoni Wit in Warsaw and Peter Hirsch in Brussels. She has also conducted acclaimed concerts with instrumental accompaniment, e.g. the Miserere of Paweł Szymański during the Warsaw Music Festival as well as Das atmende Klarsein by Luigi Nono with the famous flautist Roberto Fabriccani in Feltre, Italy. In 2007, in the town of Częstochowa, Anna Szostak gave the premiere performance of rediscovered works by the 17th century Claramontes composer, Aleksander Władysław Leszczyński, who has been hailed as a "sensational discovery" by musicologists. Another great early-music event was the revival – after 220 years - of compositions by Josef Zeidler during the Sacromontana in Gostyn. The success of Camerata Silesia – both in concert and in recordings – is in large measure also the success of its director. Most of their CDs are not only conducted by Anna Szostak, but also reflect her own distinctive creative imagination. Anna Szostak is a member of the staff at the Arts Faculty of the Silesian University where she acquired her conducting doctorate. Among the awards she has won are the Prize of the Ministry of Culture and Art (1993), the Jerzy Kurczewski Prize for services to choral music (2004), and the Prize of the Marshal of the Silesian Voivodship (2008).

The "Musikhauptschule" is a special form of school that has existed for over thirty years in the Austrian school system. The musical secondary school is open to 10 to 14 year olds and provides compulsory schooling with an emphasis on music. The aim is to familiarise children with the cultural life of the musical country of Austria; through "ear, eye, hand and heart" they are brought up to be music-loving and music-making young people who will be able to take an active and enriching part in the country's musical life. The Children's Choir of the Musikhauptschule in Bregenz has been involved in several Bregenz Festival productions: in 1981 Verdi's Otello with Placido Domingo, in 1999 Martinů's Greek Passion, in 2001/02 Puccini's La Bohème, in 2007/08 Puccini's Tosca, and in 2003 Gustav Mahler's 3rd Symphony.

Members: Francesca Alfano, Shirin Fedak, Hiltrud Fußenegger, Anna Gadner, Franziska Gerhalter, Pierre Gröber, Lorenz Hieble, Claudia Immler, Elena Kreuzwirth, Melanie Moosbrugger, Florian Natter, Hannah Nußbaumer, Laura Pedrazza, Corinna Pink, Laura Rauch, Dieter Reumiller, Melanie Schrott, Wolfgang Schwendinger, Fabienne Sotelsek, Vivienne Supan, Elisa Ulbing, Selina Waltner.

The Polish Radio Choir, based in Kraków, was founded in 1948 by Jerzy Gert. The first choirmasters of the choir were Alojzy Kluczniok and Tadeusz Dobrzański. From its beginnings till 1994 the Choir was an integral part of the Orchestra and Choir of the Polish Radio and Television Corporation in Kraków. The choir worked with numerous outstanding conductors in Poland and abroad, among others with W. Rowicki, J. Semkow, J. Krenz, A. Wit, B. Bartoletti, J. Ahronovitch and G. Sinopoli. The Choir often participated in the first performances of Polish composers' works, namely those of Lutosławski, Penderecki, Górecki and others. The Choir performed in international festivals: Settimana di Monreale, Festival Regione Lombardia, Oratorio and Cantata Festival Ratzeburg, Le Festival de la Musique Contemporaine Centre Pompidou, Rossini Opera Festival. Besides concerts the Choir made numerous recordings for the Polish Radio and Television Corporation and foreign broadcast stations and musical firms. The co–operation with EMI resulted in recordings of the complete works of Karol Szymanowski and some works of Krzysztof Penderecki. The Choir received 6 Oscar awards for recording the opera Boris Godunov by Mussorgsky. The Academia Charles Cros awarded the Grand Prix du Disque for the record with Krakow Concerto, Katyń by van de Vate, A Survivor from Warsaw by Schoenberg and Dies irae by Penderecki. 

Since 1995 the Choir has worked as an independent group within the structures of the Polish Radio. The repertoire of the Choir embraces both a cappella and orchestral compositions with a special emphasis on Polish music. At the turn of the millennium the Choir, together with the Israeli Kibbutz Orchestra, took part in a concert tour performing Stabat Mater by Szymanowski, Mass in C minor by W. A. Mozart and Schubert's Stabat Mater, conducted by Avi Ostrowski. In November 2001 the Choir participated in the Europalia 2001 Festival in Brussels, where they performed Szymanowski's Stabat Mater with the Polish National Radio Symphony Orchestra, conducted by Antoni Wit. In February 2002 the group went on tour in Switzerland, where together with the Polish Radio Orchestra conducted by Wojciech Rajski, they performed the cantata Alexander Nevski by Prokofiev. The Choir is one of the few to have Arnold Schoenberg's opera Moses and Aaron in its repertoire. In 1998 the Choir was a guest at State Theatre Darmstadt, in 2002 Teatro Massimo in Palermo, in 2003 State Theatre Stuttgart and in 2004 Hamburg State Opera.

The discography of the Polish Radio Choir consists of 60 CD recordings, four of which have been nominated for Fryderyk award of the Akademia Fonograficzna. Its recording of music by Górecki won two Fryderyk awards. In 2008/09 the Choir celebrated the 60th anniversary of its foundation with a concert on 15 November at the Polish Music Festival, and was awarded Honoris Gratia by the president of the city of Krakow. In March 2009 the Choir performed at the Tongyeong International Music Festival in Korea and in May at the Sounds New Contemporary Music Festival – Polish Connections with Penderecki’s Passion in Canterbury Cathedral. In 2009, performances are scheduled at the Bregenz Festival and in Münster.

The festival breakfast is organised by Radio Vorarlberg in conjunction with the Bregenz Festival and the Friends of the Bregenz Festival.

During the festival – as well as in the weeks leading up to it – Bregenz awakes to new life. The artists appearing at the festival add much to the atmosphere of the provincial capital. We live next-door to the musicians, conductors and actors, but we never actually get to talk to them and find out what they are like as people. It is exactly for this purpose that the festival breakfast has been arranged by the Bregenz Festival and the Friends of the Bregenz Festival together with Radio Vorarlberg. 

Just as happened last summer, so too in 2009: all sorts of festival artists will be invited to a breakfast chat in Propter Homines Hall at the Festival Opera House on four Sundays during the festival period. The hall will open at 10 a.m. and after a relaxed breakfast the conversation can get going at 10.30 a.m.