Born in 1960 in Poltava region.
His debut took place at the Kyiv State Philharmonic in 1983 with the performance of works by Stravinsky, Schoenberg, Boulez. In 1989 he graduated from the Kyiv State Conservatory in the class of Professor Allin Vlasenko, in 1990 he became a finalist of the International Conducting Competition in Prague. A year later he was appointed to the position of Chief Conductor-Artistic Director of the Ukrainian Radio Symphony Orchestra, which he held until 1999. During this period he made over 200 recordings for the Ukrainian Radio collections, which include Mozart’s symphonies Nos. 38, 41, Beethoven’s No. 9, Dvorak’s Nos. 7, 9, Brahms’s “German Requiem”, R. Strauss’s “Macbeth”, Janáček’s “Taras Bulba”, and others.
Since 1999, he has been the director of the National Honored Academic Symphony Orchestra of Ukraine. Among the hundreds of programs he has performed with the orchestra, the most important were the symphony cycles by G. Mahler and B. Lyatoshinsky, the Passions of Matthew, Luke, Mark, John and the Mass in B minor by J. S. Bach, the oratorio “Joan of Arc at the stake” by A. Honegger, the dramatic legend “The Condemnation of Faust” by G. Berlioz, “The Passion of St. Sebastian” by C. Debussy.
He has recorded over 50 CDs, and the CD album “Requiem for Larisa” by Valentin Silvestrov was nominated for a Grammy Award in 2005. He conducted the world premieres of many works by Ukrainian composers, including Symphony No. 6, oratorios “The Lay of Igor’s Campaign” and “The Passion of Taras” by Yevgeny Stankovych, Symphonies Nos. 7, 8, 9 by Valentin Sylvesterov.
He recorded music for films by Ukrainian and foreign composers (about 40 feature, documentary, and animated films).
He staged on various stages (including concert performances) the chamber opera “The Fate of Dorian” by Carmela Tsepkolenko, the opera-oratorio “Remember, My Brothers” by Vitaliy Gubarenko, the operas “When the Fern Blooms”, “The Terrible Revenge” by Yevgeny Stankovych, the operas “Rigoletto” by G. Verdi, “Sister Angelica” by G. Puccini, “Orpheus and Eurydice” by K.V. Gluck, the opera-oratorio “Oedipus Rex” by Igor Stravinsky.
He has toured in Austria, Bahrain, Belgium, Bulgaria, Great Britain, Italy, Spain, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Canada, Korea, Lebanon, Liechtenstein, the Netherlands, Germany, Oman, the United Arab Emirates, Poland, Portugal, Slovakia, the USA, Turkey, France, the Czech Republic and Japan. He has worked with many famous orchestras, including the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, the Warsaw Symphony and the Polish Radio Orchestra, the Bratislava Radio Orchestra, the Jerusalem Symphony Orchestra, the Israel Sinfonietta, the Brooklyn Philharmonic, the BBC Philharmonic and others.
V. Sirenko conducted in many famous concert halls: Concertgebouw (Amsterdam), Théâtre des Champs-Élysées (Paris), Barbican Hall and Cadogan Hall (London), Seoul Art Center, Roy Thompson Hall (Toronto), La Fenice Theater (Venice), Berlin Philharmonic, etc.
Volodymyr Sirenko is a People’s Artist of Ukraine (2008), laureate of the Taras Shevchenko National Prize of Ukraine (2001), corresponding member of the National Academy of Arts of Ukraine. In 2018, he was awarded the Order of Prince Yaroslav the Wise, 5th degree.
From 2011 to 2014, he worked as the chief conductor of the National Chamber Ensemble “Kyiv Soloists”. He resumed cooperation with the ensemble at the end of 2023.
