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Alain Lombard is among the leading French conductors from the latter half of the 20th century. He has held numerous prestigious positions both in the operatic and orchestral realms. Lombard is best known for his interpretations of French opera, particularly of Bizet's Carmen, Gounod's Faust and Roméo et Juliette, Delibes' Lakmé, and Massenet's Werther. He has also garnered notice for his Puccini and Verdi, as well as for instrumental works by Berlioz, Debussy, and Ravel. Lombard's repertory is hardly limited to French and Italian music, however, as it takes in chunks of Prokofiev, Mahler, Mendelssohn, Mozart, and many others. He has made numerous recordings since the 1960s for a range of labels, including EMI, Elektra, Erato, Forlane, and Valois.

Lombard was born in Paris on October 4, 1940. He was a prodigy, studying at the Paris Conservatory and receiving his first appointment before his 21st birthday, that of assistant conductor at the Lyons Opera in 1961. He was soon appointed principal conductor there, but departed in 1965. The following year he won the Dimitri Mitropoulos International Conducting Competition in Athens and also accepted the post of conductor of the Greater Miami Symphony Orchestra, having earlier scored a notable success in the United States: his New York debut was at the American Opera Society in 1963 when he led a highly praised performance of Massenet's Hérodiade.

Lombard became an assistant to Leonard Bernstein and in 1967 debuted at the Metropolitan Opera with Gounod's Faust. From 1974 to 1980 Lombard served as director of the Opéra du Rhin, based in Strasbourg, but also performed in Colmar and Mulhouse. By 1980 Lombard had become a major force on both opera and concert stages.

In the 1980s he held a string of impressive posts: from 1981-1983 he was music director of the Opéra National de Paris, then served in the same capacity at the Paris-based Opéra-Comique (1983); and in 1988 he accepted the dual posts of music director of the Bordeaux Opéra and the Bordeaux Aquitaine Orchestra. In 1990 he was appointed director of the Bordeaux Grand Théâtre.

Lombard was also busy in the recording studio, especially throughout the 1990s and the new century, turning out recordings of Lakmé (1990; EMI), the Mahler Fifth Symphony with the Bordeaux Aquitaine Orchestra (1998; Forlane), and several of Carmen, including the 2004 DVD of the Franco Zeffirelli/Verona production on TDK.

The Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg has a long history reflecting its home city's location near the border between France and Germany. Designated as one of France's national orchestras, it has an international reputation and has toured widely.

The Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg was founded in 1855 with Josef Hasselmans as its first conductor. During periods of German control over Strasbourg, it has been known as the Straßburger Philharmoniker. The orchestra has had a long succession of renowned music directors from Germany, France, and beyond, including Hans Pfitzner (1907-1915 and 1918-1919), a young Otto Klemperer (1915-1918), Paul Paray (1929-1940), Theodor Guschlbauer (1983-1997), Marko Letonja (2012-2021), and, as of 2021, the Aziz Shokhakimov. In addition to giving concerts, the group shares with the Orchestre Symphonique de Mulhouse the duties of permanent orchestra of the Opéra national du Rhin. With 110 musicians, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg offers an annual season of performances at the city's Palais de la musique et des congrès "Pierre Pflimlin." In 1994, the orchestra recorded the album Bal au Second Empire for the FNAC Music label.

That year, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg received designation as one of France's national orchestras. That brought international as well as national recognition, and since the turn of the century, the group has toured widely, appearing in major European halls such as the Philharmonie de Paris, the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg, and the Musikverein in Vienna, as well as traveling as far afield as Brazil, Japan, and South Korea, mounting a major tour in the latter in 2017 and immediately being invited for a return visit. The orchestra has played host to several major composers-in-residence, including Kaija Saariaho (an album of whose works the group recorded in 2015 under Letonja), Jean-Louis Agobet, and John Corigliano. The Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg has recorded for a variety of labels, including PentaTone, Ondine, and, as of the early 2020s, Warner Classics, where in 2022, it issued an album of works by Leoš Janáček that included the Glagolitic Mass. ~ James Manheim