Santtu-Matias Rouvali
© Kaapo Kamu
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Hailed by The Guardian as "the latest sit-up-and-listen talent to emerge from the great Finnish conducting tradition", Santtu-Matias Rouvali is Chief Conductor of the Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra and Principal Guest Conductor of the Copenhagen Philharmonic. He takes up the position of Chief Conductor of the Gothenburg Symphony from the 2017/18 season.
Rouvali has regular relationships with the Philharmonia Orchestra, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra and Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, and other orchestras to welcome him back in 2016/17 include the BBC Symphony, Bergen Philharmonic, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin and Bamberger Symphoniker. As Gothenburg’s Chief Conductor designate he conducts two programmes this season with soloists Marc-André Hamelin and Truls Mørk alongside Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra and Janáček’s Taras Bulba.
In October he will make his debut with the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne with a European tour, and will also return to Japan in the spring with his own orchestra, the Tampere Philharmonic, having already made successful engagements there with the Tokyo Symphony Orchestra. In North America he will return to the Los Angeles Philharmonic as well as making his debuts with Cincinnati Symphony and Minnesota orchestras.
Rouvali’s recordings include a disc with Ondine featuring Hakola and Hosokawa Guitar Concertos with Timo Korhonen and Oulu Symphony Orchestra and his latest release, of Nielsen and Sibelius’ Violin Concertos with Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra and Baiba Skride, was released in summer 2015 on ORFEO.
In addition to strong relationships with Nordic artists such as Vilde Frang, Pekka Kuusisto, Håkan Hardenberger and Kari Kriikku, notable soloist collaborations include Alisa Weilerstein, Benjamin Grosvenor, Alison Balsom and Martin Grubinger.
As an opera conductor, Rouvali has performed Bizet’s Carmen and Mozart's Die Zauberflöte with West Coast Kokkola Opera, and conducted Verdi’s La forza del destino with Tampere Opera last season.