What others say
“We’re in particularly safe hands musically. Alejo Pérez conducts without artifice and presents Stravinsky’s music in all its honesty. Argentinian by birth and serving at the Flemish Opera since 2019, Pérez is a breath of fresh air in the way he approaches the composer’s early works. Avoiding artifice, he conducts with pure naturalness and grace. An enthused, spirited Adelaide Symphony Orchestra follow with their usual high degree of accomplishment.”
InReview, Graham Strahle, 2/3/2024 (The Nightingale and Other Fables, Adelaide Festival)
“The Orkest Opera Ballet Vlaanderen was terrific. Alejo Perez’s baton was absolutely in time with the youthful exuberance of this production: daring flourishes of fortepiano in the recitatives, electrifying articulation in the strings, the ‘mafia funeral’ moments for the trumpets – those heralds of Verdi – and, of course, there was pure clarinet seduction.”
bachtrack.com, Eleanor Knight, 12/9/2023 (La Clemenza di Tito, Opera Vlaanderen)
“Pérez succeeds in giving a large ensemble the sound and energy usually found in smaller ensembles.”
forumopera.com, Maxime de Brogniez, 21/9/2023 (La Clemenza di Tito, Opera Vlaanderen)
“Conductor Alejo Pérez has the orchestra striving and yearning, swirling with passion and endlessly tender singing especially in Tristan’s death scene and Isolde’s Love Death.”
KLARA, Sylvia Broeckaert, 23/3/2023 (Tristan und Isolde, Opera Vlaanderen)
“The music then becomes the key word of the performance, first and foremost through the direction of Alejo Pérez. His intense reading of the work (…) is greeted with a standing ovation by the audience.”
Forum Opera, Christophe Rizoud, 26/3/2023 (Tristan und Isolde, Opera Vlaanderen)
“The production is carried out by an impeccable cast, supported by Alejo Pérez’ scalpel-precise direction, which highlights the score’s modernity, its power, its formal and orchestral richness, and its lyricism, leaving the audience overwhelmed by its power at the end.”
Avant Scène Opera, Alfred Caron, 9/9/2022 (Aufstieg und Fall der Stadt Mahagonny, Opera Vlaanderen)
“Alejo Pérez on the podium of the brilliant Orchestre de la Suisse Romande ingeniously implements Bieito's concept with the means of conducting dialectics. The Argentinean subtly traces the ambiguity of the score. Prokofiev proves to be much more subtle in his alienation than his colleague Shostakovich. Whoever says yes (especially in the overwhelming chorus parts) may very well mean no. For all the lavishness of the music-making, Alejo Pérez twists and turns the staves, discovers in all the sensitively played out nuances what a great complex score Prokofiev has left us here.”
Opernwelt, Peter Krause, November 2021 (War and Peace, Grand Théâtre de Genève)
“Alejo Pérez, remarkably efficient, alert to every feeling, revealing tenderness as well as murderous madness, an unparalleled creator and lover of sound, is particularly at ease in this musical element.”
letemps.ch, Sylvie Bonier, 16/9/2021 (War and Peace, Grand Théâtre de Genève)
“A splendid production, both in its staging and in its musical execution. Alejo Pérez, together with the Flemish Opera Symphony Orchestra, not only revels in the late-Romantic orchestral floods; he captures the forward-rushing, pulsating parlando sound, as well as the flashing wit and twists and turns ranging from joie de vivre to the depths of the abyss.”
Die deutsche Bühne, Joachim Lange, 2/3/2020 (Der Schmied von Gent)
“Alejo Pérez’ musical direction cuts the Lyon Opera Orchestra to the bone, bringing forth a clear, incisive sound, with the brass section taken to its limits, solo violinist Nicolas Gourbeix an admirable standout, and the conductor striking an extraordinary balance between lyricism and severity, a tour de force approach to Janáček’s complex music.”
Christian Merlin, Le Figaro, 24/1/2019
“Musically, the Flemish Opera’s symphony orchestra showed itself to be in top form. For Alejo Pérez, the new music director of the house, this Lohengrin was first and foremost a resounding personal success. With energy and focus, the conductor successfully built the tension – from the clear, ethereally shimmering prelude, to the pounding rhythms of the choral scenes in the first act, through to the dramaturgically pointed scenes in the second act between Friedrich and Ortrud as well as Ortrud and Elsa, to the pleasing sensibility of the third act.”
Das Opernglas, M. Fiedler, 7/10/2018
“The crispness and elegance of Alejo Pérez’ conducting style are combined with the kind of inspiring imaginative ability an orchestra needs to test and transcend its boundaries.”
Die Welt, Peter Krause, 21/3/2018
“Pérez impressed as a podium talent to watch.”
Chicago Tribune, John von Rhein, 27/2/2017
“More relaxed and joyful than in the Strauss, the Vienna Philharmonic and the highly-talented Alejo Pérez created a wonderful sound, treading the fine line between penetrating pathos and sentiment without becoming sweet or sensationalist. In Marguerite’s great scene, the conductor and orchestra sparkled. A great achievement.”
Online Musik Magazin, Thomas Tillmann, 20/8/2016
“Alejo Pérez conducted the Teatro Colón orchestra with great devotion and attention to detail. (...) The great interludes were also impressively successful.”
Der neue Merker, Klaus Billand, December 2015 (Parsifal)
“From Wagner’s opulence to the soft backlight of impressionism, from veristic emotional outbursts to seditiously expressionistic opalescence: under the direction of the magician Alejo Pérez who can turn frogs into princes, the orchestra of l’Opéra de Lyon brought Schreker’s visions to life.”
Le Monde, 17/3/2015 (The Stigmatised)