Born in Budapest in 1968, István Silló commenced his studies at the Ferenc Liszt Academy of Music in 1986 under the guidance of such noted masters as Rita Wagner, Kálmán Záborszky, Igor Lenke, Gábor Ugrin, Ervin Lukács, András Mihály, Imre Földes and Tamás Gál. During his studies, he served as répétiteur of the Béla Bartók Conservatory of Music's voice department from 1987-1988, and from 1988-1990 of the academy's clarinet department. Between 1986 and 1990 he was a regular auxiliary member of the Hungarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, where he worked with Lamberto Gardelli, Eric Ericson, András Ligeti and Kobayashi Ken-Ichiro, among others. He served as music director of the József Attila Theatre from 1990 before filling the same post at the Budapest Chamber Theatre between 1993 and 1996. In parallel with this, he was a lecturer at the University of Theatre and Film Arts from 1990, and was appointed professor later on. From 1996 to 2008 he was conductor of the Budapest Operetta Theatre. During this time, he took the podium on more than one thousand evenings and served as music director for countless premieres. Among the works he is associated with is the world premiere of Ferenc 'Fegya' Jávori's Wedding Dance, which won him the Artisjus Award for the high-quality performance of contemporary Hungarian music. He works with several of Hungary's orchestras, including the Hungarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Győr Philharmonic Orchestra, the Pannon Philharmonic and the Szeged Symphony Orchestra. Since 2005 he has been a recurring guest at the Szeged Open-Air Festival. He has appeared as a guest conductor in Germany, the Netherlands, the United States, Italy, Japan, China, Russia, Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei, Vietnam and South Korea.