Jürgen Flimm grew up in Cologne and studied theatre studies, German and sociology. In 1986 he became assistant director at the Münchner Kammerspiele, later director at the National Theatre Mannheim and in 1973 senior director at the Thalia Theater Hamburg.In 1979 he became artistic director of the Kölner Schauspiel. In 1985 he returned to the Thalia Theater in the same position, ran it for fifteen years and made it one of Germany’s most artistically and economically successful spoken theatre.

His first operatic work was Luigi Nono’s al gran sole carico d’amore in Frankfurt in 1978, followed by Jacques Offenbach’s Les Contes d’Hoffmann at the Hamburg State Opera in 1981 and Cosi fan tutte in Amsterdam in 1990.There he collaborated for the first time with Nikolaus Harnoncourt, who was skolaus Harnoncourt, who was up rst time with Nikolaus Harnoncourt, who was up ince then his most important artistic partner. Jürgen Flimm’s productions of the past years at La Scala in Milan, the Metropolitan Opera New York, the Royal Opera House Covent Garden, the Chicago Opera, the Berlin State Opera, The Opera Zurich and the Vienna and Hamburg State Opera include works of Beethoven, Haydn, Mozart, Schubert, Verdi, Gounod, Stravinsky, Cerha and Schreker. In the summer of 2000 he directed a new production of Ring des Nibelungen at the Bayreuth Festival, in October 2000 he staged Beethoven’s Fidelio at the MET, in June 2002 he was responsible for the scenic realization of the first night of Friedrich Cerha’s Der Riese vom Steinfeld at the Vienna State Opera and in March 2004 he staged Richard Strauss’s Salome at the MET.

In 1987 the collaboration with the Salzburg Festival started with Raimund’s Der Bauer als Millionär. This production was followed by Johann Nestroy’s Das Mädl aus der Vorstadt, Hofmannsthal’s Der Schwierige, Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea, Purcell’s King Arthur, Mozart’s Lucio Silla and Rossini’s Moïse et Pharaon.

In 2010 he staged Wissen Sie, wie man Töne macht? Satiesfactionen at the Werkstatt of the Staatsoper im Schiller Theater, in 2011 Händel’s Il trionfo del Tempo e del Disinganno also at the Staatsoper im Schillertheater and in May 2012 Mozart’s La clemenza di Tito at the Vienna State Opera.
Further productions were Manon Lescaut in St. Petersburg and Rossini’s Othello at La Scala in Milan.

Jürgen Flimm was professor at the University of Hamburg, he is member of the Academies of Arts in Hamburg, Munich, Berlin and Frankfurt and an honorary doctor of the University of Hildesheim. He was awarded several prizes including the Grimme-Preis, the Medal for Art and Science of the Free and Hanse Town Hamburg, the Konrad-Wolf-Prize of the Academy of Arts in Berlin, the Max-Brauer-Prize of the Alfred Toepfer Foundation F.V.S., The Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (Verdienstorden der Bundesrepublik Deutschland), the the Österreichische Ehrenkreuz für Kunst und Wissenschaft (Austrian Cross of Honour for Arts and Sciences) and the Ehrenzeichen des Landes Salzburg (Award of Honor of the State of Salzburg).

From 1999 to 2003 Jürgen Flimm was president of the Deutscher Bühnenverein. From 2002 to 2004 he was director of drama at the Salzburg Festival. From 2005 to 2008 he led the RuhrTriennale and from 2007 to 2010 he was artistic director at the Salzburg Festival. Since December 2010 he is artistic director of the Staatsoper Unter den Linden.