The Victor Hugo Orchestra has created two assistant conductor positions in 2022, selected among the candidates of the Besançon International Competition for Young Conductors. The first tandem is composed of the German Ustina Dubitsky and the French Laurent Comte.
Ustina Dubitsky
The multi-faceted talent of conductor Ustina Dubitsky became apparent at an early age. She took her first steps on the stage as a member of the Munich Opera Children's Choir, while at the same time undergoing intensive training as a violinist. As concertmaster of some of the best youth orchestras in Germany, she developed her leadership skills under the guidance of great conductors like Mariss Jansons.
Ustina Dubitsky studied conducting in Weimar and Zurich with Markus L. Frank, Gunter Kahlert, Nicolás Pasquet and Johannes Schlaefli, among others. During the 2018/19 season, she was a scholarship student at the Bergische Symphoniker Conducting Academy. She also received guidance from Peter Eötvös, David Zinman and Paavo Järvi during masterclasses.
Ustina Dubitsky was artistic director of the Collegium Musicum Weimar from 2015 to 2018 as well as of the VHS Choir Leipzig from 2017 to 2019. In recent years, she has conducted numerous concerts with, among others, the Jenaer Philharmonie, the Musikkollegium Winterthur, the Bergische Symphoniker, the Göttinger Symphonieorchester or the musicians of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra.
Laurent Comte
Saxophonist, Laurent Comte obtained his prize of Perfectionnement at the Conservatoire of Besançon in the class of Cécile Dubois; he holds a licence of musicology.
In 2013, he takes a strong interest in conducting and obtains his Diploma of Musical Studies in Besançon, as well as the Diploma of the Ecole Normale de Musique de Paris. In June 2019, he will obtain his Master's degree in Orchestral Conducting at the Haute Ecole de Musique de Lausanne in the class of Aurélien Azan Zielinski. During his studies he studied at the Haute Ecole de Musique in Prague with Tomás Koutnik and Ivan Parik. He was assistant conductor to Norbert Baxa in the production of Hamlet at the Opera of Plzen (Czech Republic).
His experience was forged in contact with the Victor Hugo Orchestra, the International Academy of Atri, the Orchestre Musique en Seine in Paris, the Massy Opera, the University Symphony Orchestra and the HEMU of Lausanne, the North Philarmonic Czech of Teplice...
Passionate about pedagogy, he is the director of the Ecole de Musique Intercommunale du Pays d'Ornans where he teaches saxophone and shares his technical knowledge of conducting at the CRR of Besançon where he is also responsible for the Symphony Orchestra.
