Christof Loy was born on December the 5th ,1962, in Essen as the son of an architect and an interpreter. Loy attended the "Burggymnasium" (a local grammar school) and started to study direction of music theatre at the Folkwang-school in Essen at the age of fourteen.
Whilst finishing his Abitur (A-levels) he directed his first play and was awarded the universities’ internationally much sought-after "Folkwang-Award" for his production of "Pimpinone". After leaving his grammar school which focused on classical education, Loy studied at the Folkwang-University until 1982. His academic education was completed by a "studium generale" in Munich, where he studied art history, Italian philology and theatre studies until 1984.

In 1984, Loy became assistant to the director in Gelsenkirchen, at the "Musiktheater im Revier" (local music theatre), where he worked among others with Dietrich Hilsdorf and Jaroslav Chundela. From 1986 onwards, he worked at the National Theatre, Wiesbaden and became an independently working director for (music) theatre four years later (1990).

According to himself, he highlighted his special liking of Mozart’s operas right from the beginning of his career and concentrated on "the jesting of the hearts, desert and being deserted, forsake and being forsaken"(cf. ZEIT, 12.11.1982). Ideally, Loy stated in the "Stuttgarter Nachrichten" (7.8.1993), "an opera accomplishes to dissolve the laws of nature and people" and furthermore, he believes opera to inherit a "mystic quality".

In a free production for the "Alte Schloss", Stuttgart, Loy directed (among others) Mozart’s "Die Zauberflöte" ("The Magic Flute"), Gorki’s "Children of the Sun" and Monteverdi’s "L’incoronazione di Poppea" ("The Coronation of Poppea") in the mid-90’s. In Freiburg/Breisgau he directed "Die Entführung aus dem Serail" ("The Abduction from the Seraglio"), in Bremen Benjamin Britten’s "Peter Grimes" as well as Wagner’s "Tannhäuser" in Gelsenkirchen. Both critics and audiences were enthusiastic about his sparkling, witty and wholly original approach to music theatre and attested him to create productions that "get under one’s skin". According to critics, Loy also produced vivid and moving works with his version of Shakespeare’s "A Winter’s Tale" as well as with Marivaux’ comedy "Triumph of Love" which was performed in 1996 in Stuttgart for the first time and led to an invitation to the "Berliner Theatertreffen" in 1997. Before that, he had produced Racine’s "Phaedra" in 1994 and Maeterlinck’s "Pelléas und Mélisande" in 1995, both at the "Schauspielhaus Stuttgart".

In 1997, he interpreted Massenet’s "Manon" in Duesseldorf and in 1998 he directed the first German production of Marber’s "Closer" (German title: "Hautnah"), a bitter comedy of relationships in the age of the Internet. The "Süddeutsche Zeitung" (3.2.1998) maintained that he proved "a great feeling for the comedy of the situations in the text". After the big success of the premiere of Mozart’s "La finta gardiniera" ("The Pretended Gardener") in Duesseldorf at the end of the season 1998, he directed Donizetti’s most popular tragic opera "Lucia di Lammermoor" for the "Deutsche Oper am Rhein" (Rhine Opera) (premiere in Duisburg, 1999). In Graz, L. created his "Don Giovanni in realistic climax" (cf. SZ, 17.12.1999) in 1999 and brought on stage Mozart’s "Le nozze di Figaro" (The Marriage of Figaro") at the beginning of the season 2000/2001.

Critics maintain that Loy not only proves to have a good eye for details and great musicality, but also a highly sensitive feeling for the personalities of the artists he works with and these qualities are more and more being acknowledged abroad, too. Loy has performed as guest director in Brussels and at Royal Opera House Covent Garden, London.

However, according to himself, the "Deutsche Oper am Rhein Duesseldorf-Duisburg (Rhine Opera) has become his "artistic home". Here, his great talent had been discovered early and he has ever since been allowed every artistic freedom. This is where he developed his Monteverdi cycle encompassing the three documented operas by this composer. Another important stage in his career is the Théâtre Royal de la Monnaie, Brussels, where Loy found artistic partners who keep having a strong forming influence on his career: Brussels’ General Music Director Antonio Pappano took over the Royal Opera House Covent Garden with the start of the season 2002/2003 and opened the new season with a production of Loy’s ("Ariadne auf Naxos"). In addition Bernd Loebe, having given up his position as artistic director to become theater manager at Frankfurt Opera, has collaborated with Loy on several occasions to realize projects such as "The Abduction from the Seraglio" in 2003 and Gounods "Faust" in 2005.

Productions include: Mozart’s "Die Zauberflöte" ("The Magic Flute", 1990 Stuttgart) and "Die Entführung aus dem Serail" ("The Abduction from the Seraglio", 1992 Freiburg); Lehár’s "Die lustige Witwe" ("The Merry Widow", 1992 Ulm); Britten’s "Peter Grimes" (1993 Bremen), Wagner’s "Tannhäuser" (1995 Gelsenkirchen), Massenet’s "Werther" (1996 Bremen) and "Manon" (1997 Duesseldorf), Mozart’s "Le nozze di Figaro" ("The Marriage of Figaro", 1998 Brussels), Marber’s "Closer" ("Hautnah", 1998 Munich), Donizetti’s "Lucia di Lammermoor" (1999 Duesseldorf), Mozart’s "Don Giovanni" (1999 Graz), Mozart’s "Die Entführung aus dem Serail" ("The Abduction from the Seraglio", 1999 Brussels), Berlioz’ "La damnation de Faust" ("The damnation of Faust", 2000 Bremen), Verdi’s "Don Carlos" (2000 Duisburg), Rossini’s "L’Italiana in Algeri" ("The Italian Girl in Algiers") and Monteverdi’s "L’Orfeo" ("The fable of Orpheus", 2001), Tchaikovsky’s "Eugen Onegin", Strauss’ "Der Rosenkavalier" (2001 Brussels), Handel’s "Alcina" (2002 Hamburg) and Puccini’s "La Bohème" (2002, Brussels), the twin-production "Cavalleria rusticana" and "Pagliacci", as well as "Il Ritorno d’Ulisse in Patria" ("The Return of Ulysses" 2003 Duesseldorf), Handel’s "Saul", as well as Donizetti’s "Roberto Devereux" (2003 /2004 Munich, Bavarian State Opera), Monteverdi`s "L’incoronazione di Poppea" ("The Coronation of Poppea"), Mozart’s "Magic Flute" and Offenbach’s "Les contes d’Hoffmann" (all of them 2004 Deutsche Oper am Rhein), Gounod’s "Faust" (2005 Frankfurt), Rossini’s "Il Turco in Italia" (2005 Hamburg), "Les Troyens" by Berlioz and Offenbach’s "La belle Hélène" (both 2005 Deutsche Oper am Rhein), Mozart’s "La Clemenza di Tito" (2006 Frankfurt).

In 2005, the project "Mozart in Paris" was realized in collaboration with Stuttgart State Theatre, Hamburg State Opera and the Deutsche Oper am Rhein, a retelling by Christof Loy based on letters written by the Mozart family.

His latest project is Mozart’s "La Finta Semplice", which premiered in June 2006 at the "Bockenheimer Depot", Frankfurt Opera.

A number of Christof Loy’s projects have been documented on film: "L’Orfeo" (Speranza classics), "The Abduction from the Seraglio" (hrMedia), and "Roberto Devereux" (Deutsche Grammophon, June 2006).

Awards include: Loy was awarded with the "Folkwang-Award" and the "Otto-Kasten-Award" of the "Deutsche Bühnenverein" (engl.: "community of the German stages"), his production "Triumph of Love" was invited to the "Berliner Theatertreffen" (engl. "Theatre meeting, Berlin"); for "Closer" (German title: "Hautnah") he was awarded the "Star" of the "Abendzeitung", in 2001 he was awarded with the "Music Award of the city of Duisburg". In the same year, Loy received the prestigious "Director of the Year" prize, awarded by the critics of "Opernwelt" magazine, in particular for his productions of Händel’s "Saul" at Bavarian State Opera, Munich, and Monteverdi’s "Il Ritorno di Ulisse in Patria" at Deutsche Oper am Rhein. In 2004, Loy was again awarded "Director of the Year" for the second time in a row, this time with an emphasis on his version of Mozart’s "Abduction from the Seraglio" at Frankfurt Opera.

Scheduled projects are, amongst others, "Arabella" (Gothenburg Opera, premieres 25th October 2006), "Giulio Cesare" (Theater an der Wien, premieres 3rd April 2007), "Simon Boccanegra" (Frankfurt Opera, premieres 20th May 2007), "Armida" (Salzburg Festival, July 2007), "Lucio Silla" (Royal Danish Theatre, Kopenhagen, premieres 22nd December 2007).