MĀRIS KUPČS began his musical career as a choral conductor, winning countless international competitions over a period of 10 years with Balsis, the choir he founded, including the prestigious BBC award “The Silver Rose Bowl”. Later turning to the harpsichord and orchestral conducting, he founded the Baroque orchestra Collegium Musicum Riga and the Baroque choir Collegium Choro Musici Riga, as well as the Early Music Department at the Jāzeps Vītols Latvian Academy of Music. Māris Kupčs has worked with equal success in symphonic  concerts, opera and musical theatre, performing as a guest conductor in the Baltic States, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Italy, Poland, Russia, Sweden, Israel and the USA.

Māris Kupčs has conducted numerous opera and musical theatre productions, including Johann Strauss’s “Die Fledermaus” at the Latvian National Opera, “Wiener Waltz” at Liepāja Theatre, Zigmars Liepiņš’s opera “Notre-Dame de Paris” at the Latvian National Theatre, and more than 25 Baroque and Classical operas, including Caccini’s “Euridice”, Gluck’s “Orfeo ed Euridice”, Handel’s “Acis and Galatea”, “Deidamia” and “Serse”, Monteverdi’s “L’Orfeo”, Mozart’s “Don Giovanni” and “Mitridate, re di Ponto”, Salieri’s “Prima la Musica, poi le Parole” and Vivaldi’s “Ottone in Villa”.

Alongside his active concert career, he also works as a producer of stage productions and recordings. Among his many recordings, particular mention should be made of his collaboration with the Liepāja Symphony Orchestra on the CD “Blow, Wind!”, which received the Latvian Music Recording Award 2000 and remained one of the best-selling CDs in Latvian history for more than five years. Since 2018, Māris Kupčs has been an artist with the prestigious British label Toccata Classics .

Māris Kupčs is a respected and sought-after guest lecturer at European higher education institutions, particularly on topics relating to choral singing and performance practice in Bach’s time, 17th- and 18th-century opera performance and theatre repertoire, as well as early Romantic orchestral performance. Since 2020, he has been an associate professor at the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre. Since 2014, Māris Kupčs has been selected as one of Europe’s early music mentors in the international Creative Europe project EEEMERGING (Emerging European Ensembles). In 2020, he was appointed an Officer of the Order of the Three Stars for his achievements in early music research.