Bernd Ruf is considered as one of the most famous border-crossers in the German music scene. His main focus is the combination and contrasting of classical, contemporary music, jazz and what is termed world music. As a freelance conductor, he has worked at home and abroad, and has regularly guest-conducted the Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra and the Stuttgart Philharmonic Orchestra for several years. He creates and directs the annual "Bridges to the Classics" concert for the Händelfestspiele Halle. With the ORF Radio Orchestras in Vienna, he staged a Latin Night and a Tango Night with the Stuttgart Philharmonic. For the jazz icon Joe Lovano, he conducted the premiere of a concerto for saxophone and orchestra at the Bell Atlantic Jazz Festival in New York and a rock symphonic tour for the Irish rock poet Chris De Burgh. After his Music Director studies, Bernd Ruf was assistant to Dennis Russell Davies for a few years at the Stuttgart Chamber Orchestra and the Salzburg Festival. As an experienced interpreter of contemporary music, he regularly conducts world premieres in close collaboration with composers. Bernd Ruf is the founder and artistic director of the GermanPops Orchestra. The orchestra is specialized in studio productions and live concerts in the Classical Crossover area. In 2002, together with his orchestra, he was nominated for a Grammy in the USA (CD Paquito D'Rivera - The Clarinetist, Volume One). As an instrumentalist and singer, Bernd Ruf works alongside Gregor and Veit Hübner and Karl Albrecht Fischer in the Ensemble Tango Five. For the realization of his cross-border projects, Bernd Ruf has received funding from the Karajan Foundation in Berlin, the Art Foundation Baden-Württemberg, the Goethe Institute and the German Consulate General in New York.