Grammy Award-winning conductor Paavo Järvi serves as music director of the Zurich Tonhalle Orchestra, as the long-standing artistic director of the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, and as both the founder and artistic director of the Estonian Festival Orchestra.

As a guest conductor, Järvi regularly appears with the Berlin Philharmonic, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, London Philharmonia, and New York Philharmonic. This season, he conducts the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Berlin Staatskapelle, NDR Elbphilharmonie, Shanghai Symphony, and Hong Kong Philharmonic. He also continues to enjoy close relationships with many of the orchestras of which he was previously music director, including Orchestre de Paris, Frankfurt Radio Symphony, and Tokyo’s NHK Symphony Orchestra. He made his San Francisco Symphony debut in April 2000.

In 2024, Järvi and the Tonhalle Orchestra received an International Classical Music Award for their recording of Bruckner’s Symphony No. 8 on Alpha Classics. Last September, the label released Bruckner’s Symphony No. 9, coinciding with the 200th anniversary of the composer’s birth. This spring, they release Mahler’s Symphony No. 5, the first release in a complete cycle which will span the seasons to follow.

With the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, Järvi has won both the 2024 Opus Klassik and 2023 Gramophone Orchestra of the Year awards, as well as the 2019 Rheingau Music Prize and Opus Klassik Conductor of the Year. Other honors include a Grammy Award for his recording of Sibelius’s cantatas with the Estonian National Symphony, Gramophone and Diapason Artist of the Year, and Commandeur de L’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres awarded by the French Ministry of Culture. In 2015 Järvi was presented with the Sibelius Medal in recognition of his work in bringing the Finnish composer’s music to a wider public, and, in 2012, he received the Hindemith Prize for Art and Humanity. As a dedicated supporter of Estonian culture, Järvi was awarded the Order of the White Star by the President of Estonia in 2013.
 

As a pianist, curator, educator, musical leader, and artistic collaborator, Kirill Gerstein explores resonant themes across a vast spectrum of repertoire—from Baroque suites and Classical concertos to contemporary creations, jazz, and cabaret.

Recently, Gerstein was artist in residence with the Bavarian Radio Symphony, a spotlight artist with the London Symphony Orchestra, a resident artist at the Aix-en-Provence Festival, and a curator at Wigmore Hall. Highlights of the current season include appearances with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Berlin Philharmonic, Orchestre National de France, BBC Symphony, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Vienna Symphony, Dresden Staatskapelle, St. Louis Symphony, Pittsburgh Symphony, and Atlanta Symphony. He made his San Francisco Symphony debut in July 2005.

Media projects, broadcasts, and digital innovation represent an integral part of Gerstein’s creativity. He has recorded for Platoon/Apple Music, Myrios, Deutsche Grammophon, Decca, and Berlin Philharmonics Recordings. Gerstein’s world premiere recording of Thomas Adès’s Piano Concerto with the Boston Symphony was nominated for three Grammys and received the 2020 Gramophone Award. Since giving the world premiere, he has performed the work more than 50 times, with 20 different orchestras. Gerstein has also commissioned and premiered new works by Timo Andres, Chick Corea, Alexander Goehr, Oliver Knussen, and Brad Mehldau, among others.

At the age of 16, Gerstein completed his undergraduate and graduate degrees at the Manhattan School of Music. In 2001, he won the 10th Arthur Rubinstein Competition, and has also received the Gilmore Artist Award and an Avery Fisher Career Grant. He was awarded an honorary doctorate from the Manhattan School of Music in 2021 and serves on the faculty of Berlin’s Hanns Eisler Hochschule and the Kronberg Academy.