The English conductor, Mark Stephenson, studied at the Royal Academy of Music in London. When he was only 21, he was auditioned as a 'cellist for Maestro Riccardo Muti and The Philharmonia, and subsequently played with the orchestra for ten years under Vladimir Ashkenazy, Carlo Maria Giulini, Bernard Haitink, Mariss Jansons, Eugen Jochum, Kirill Kondrashin, Lorin Maazel, Riccardo Muti, Seiji Ozawa, Simon Rattle, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Kurt Sanderling, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Yuri Simonov, Giuseppe Sinopoli and Svetlanov. In 1986 Maestro Giuseppe Sinopoli invited him to conduct The Philharmonia at rehearsals in New York, Verona, Tokyo, Brussels, East Berlin, Munich and Zürich.