Timothy Brock

Widely recognized as one of the world’s leading authorities on film music and beyond, Timothy Brock has conducted many of the most prestigious orchestras worldwide, including the New York Philharmonic, Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Austrian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, all the major French orchestras, Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, Orchestre de la Suisse Romande, Orchestra della Toscana, Orchestra del Teatro Massimo di Palermo, Orchestra del Teatro Comunale di Bologna, and the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France. He is a regular guest at renowned venues such as the Vienna Konzerthaus, London’s Barbican Centre, the Philharmonie de Paris, BOZAR Brussels, Maison de Radio France, Teatro de la Zarzuela in Madrid, and the Auditorium de Lyon.

In December 2011, Brock made his debut at Paris’s Salle Pleyel. During the 2011–2012 season, he appeared twice with the New York Philharmonic, returning again in 2015 and 2016, and toured with the orchestra to Shanghai in the summer of 2016. In recent years, he has made debut appearances in Montreal, Tokyo, Kuala Lumpur, and Lisbon, while continuing to return regularly to Madrid, Paris, Lyon, London, Glasgow, Vienna, Rome, Florence, Milan, and Turin.

Born in Olympia, Washington, in 1963, Timothy Brock is active both as a conductor and composer. He specializes in repertoire from the first half of the twentieth century and in live performances of silent films with orchestral accompaniment. His compositions include three symphonies, two operas, several concertos for solo instrument and orchestra, and more than twenty original scores for silent films. Throughout his career, he has also presented more than thirty North American premieres of works by composers such as Shostakovich, Eisler, Schulhoff, and others.

In 1999, the Chaplin Foundation commissioned Brock to restore the original score for Modern Times. This marked the beginning of a fruitful collaboration between the Chaplin family and the Cineteca di Bologna, resulting in the restoration of the original music for all of Charlie Chaplin’s major masterpieces, which Brock has subsequently performed around the world.

Brock has composed scores for films by Buster Keaton, Ernst Lubitsch, Robert Wiene, F.W. Murnau, Fritz Lang, John Ford, and many others. He has also restored celebrated film scores, including Shostakovich’s The New Babylon and Pizzetti/Mazza’s Cabiria.

Recent engagements have included concerts across the United States, two performances at the Philharmonie de Paris, appearances in Brussels, and a new production of West Side Story at the Teatro Comunale di Bologna. He recently made his debut at the Teatro di San Carlo in Naples conducting Gershwin’s Lady, Be Good!, as well as at the Teatro Massimo di Palermo in June 2024. These engagements complement his regular collaborations with major orchestras from Tokyo to Montreal and from Vienna to Paris, alongside upcoming debuts in Stockholm, Copenhagen, Macau, and San Francisco.

In July 2023, Brock conducted a production of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Carousel at the Teatro Comunale di Bologna. Among his recent appearances at the Ravenna Festival was the July 18, 2021 screening of Buster Keaton’s The General, featuring Brock’s original score. He returned to the Festival in 2023 to conduct the newly restored version—both film and score—of Chaplin’s The Great Dictator. The world premiere of this restoration took place on June 23 at the Baths of Caracalla in Rome, with Brock conducting the Orchestra del Teatro dell’Opera di Roma. During the 2024, 2025, and 2026 seasons, he has presented this production with many of the world’s leading orchestras.

A notable recent milestone was his debut with the Orchestra del Maggio Musicale Fiorentino conducting Disney’s Fantasia, which achieved three consecutive sold-out performances during the first week of 2025. In recent months, he also made his debut with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra (CBSO). Looking ahead, Brock is scheduled to make his debut conducting the Filarmonica della Scala at Teatro alla Scala in November 2026.

His engagements for 2027 include return appearances in Lyon and Palermo with the Orchestra del Teatro Massimo, performances in Toulouse, a new project with the Haydn Orchestra of Bolzano and Trento, and his debut with the Seattle Symphony.