The GMJO tour repertoire ranges from classical to contemporary music with the emphasis on the great symphonic works of the Romantic and late Romantic periods. Its high artistic level and international success have prompted many leading conductors and soloists to perform with the GMJO, such as Claudio Abbado, David Afkham, Herbert Blomstedt, Pierre Boulez, Semyon Bychkov, Riccardo Chailly, Myung-Whun Chung, Teodor Currentzis, Sir Colin Davis, Peter Eötvös, Christoph Eschenbach, Iván Fischer, Daniele Gatti, Michael Gielen, Bernard Haitink, Daniel Harding, Manfred Honeck, Jakub Hrůša, Neeme und Paavo Järvi, Mariss Jansons, Philippe Jordan, Vladimir Jurowski, Sir Neville Marriner, Ingo Metzmacher, Kent Nagano, Václav Neumann, Jonathan Nott, Seiji Ozawa, Sir Antonio Pappano, Kirill Petrenko, Jukka-Pekka Saraste, Christian Thielemann, Lorenzo Viotti, and Franz Welser-Möst.

Amongst the renowned soloists who have worked with the GMJO are Martha Argerich, Yuri Bashmet, Lisa Batiashvili, Renaud and Gautier Capuçon, Angela Denoke, Christian Gerhaher, Matthias Goerne, Susan Graham, Thomas Hampson, Leonidas Kavakos, Evgenij Kissin, Christa Ludwig, Radu Lupu, Yo-Yo Ma, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Anne Sofie von Otter, Maxim Vengerov, and Frank Peter Zimmermann.

The GMJO has been a regular guest at the most prestigious concert halls and festivals for many years, such as the Musikverein in Vienna, the Concertgebouw Amsterdam, the Elbphilharmonie Hamburg and the Philharmonie Berlin, the Teatro alla Scala di Milano, the Semperoper and the Kulturpalast Dresden, the Suntory Hall in Tokyo, the Mozarteum Argentino in Buenos Aires, the Salzburg Easter Festival, the Edinburgh Festival, the BBC Proms, and the Lucerne Festival. Since its founding years, the GMJO has a close collaboration with the Salzburg Festival.

Numerous former members of the GMJO are now members of leading European orchestras, many of them in principal positions. A partnership with the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden was therefore agreed in 2012 and expanded in 2024 in cooperation with the Dresden Philharmonie im Kulturpalast.

Since its foundation in 1986/87, the GUSTAV MAHLER JUGENDORCHESTER has received substantial support from the Federal Ministry for Housing, Arts, Culture, Media and Sport of the Republic of Austria and from the cultural department of the City of Vienna.

The GUSTAV MAHLER JUGENDORCHESTER was appointed “Ambassador UNICEF Austria” in 2012, on the occasion of its 25th anniversary.

Erste Group and Vienna Insurance Group - 
Main Sponsors of the GUSTAV MAHLER JUGENDORCHESTER

In 2003, Claudio Abbado was the driving force in the foundation of the new orchestra for the Lucerne Festival – which had originally been founded as a music cycle expressly for Arturo Toscanini before the war – and led the first concert cycle of this orchestra in August 2003. The backbone of the orchestra is the Mahler Chamber Orchestra. In addition, members of the Berlin and the Vienna Philharmonic, internationally renowned soloists and musicians of the Sabine Meyer Ensemble, the Hagen Quartet and of the Alban Berg Quartet are part of the orchestra.

The Orchestra Mozart was launched in Bologna in 2004, with Claudio Abbado acting as the artistic and music director. In November 2004, the Kythera Culture Foundation awarded him the Premio Krythera in Bologna which he used for scholarships for two young musicians of his orchestra.

In January 2005 Abbado began to work with the Simón Bolívar Orchestra in Caracas and Havana. This youth orchestra forms part of the gigantic initiative in which José Antonio Abreu has been active for the past thirty years. The project involves 250.000 young musicians, many of whom come from slums or poor neighbourhoods, and who have been offered a chance to escape a poverty-stricken existence, to play instruments and to receive a good education.

Among the recordings of Claudio Abbado, many of which have received international awards, are the complete symphonies by Beethoven, Schubert, Mendelssohn, Brahms, Tchaikovsky, Mahler, Ravel and Prokofiev, as well as operas by Mozart, Rossini, Verdi and Wagner. In 2000, the complete edition of Beethoven’s symphonies with the Berlin Philharmonic was released; it was equally celebrated as the cycle of live recordings of Beethoven’s symphonies and piano concertos from the year 2001, which was also released on DVD.

In December 2004, Mahler's Symphony No. 9 with the GUSTAV MAHLER JUGENDORCHESTER, conducted by Claudio Abbado, was released on DVD; in July 2009, Mahler’s Symphony no. 4 (with Juliane Banse) and Schoenberg’s Pelleas und Melisande followed.

His recordings have received illustrious awards, such as the International Grammy Award, the Grand Prix International du Disque, Diapason d’or, Record Grammy Prize, Stella d’oro, Orphée d’or and the Grand Prix de la Nouvelle Académie.

Claudio Abbado has received several awards; among them the Freud-Price, the Gold Medal of the International Gustav Mahler Society, the Nicolai Medal in Gold of the Vienna Philharmonic (1980), the Mozart Medal, the Mahler Medal, the Schubert Medal, the Honorary Ring of the City of Vienna, and the Premio Nonino (1999).

The Republic of Italy awarded him the Gran Croce Ordine al Merito and the Medaglia d’oro ai Benemeriti della cultura e dell’arte. He received the French Grand Croix de la Légion d’Honneur as well as the Great Golden Honorary Medal of the Republic of Austria. In Germany, he received the Ernst von Siemens Music Award and was elected conductor of the year in 2001. Claudio Abbado received the Würth Award of Jeunesses Musicales and the Critics Award of the Association of German Critics (2002). In the same year, the President of the Federal Republic of Germany commended him for the high value of his artistic achievements in Berlin with the highest award of the Federal Republic of Germany: the Great Cross with Star of the Order of Merit. In 2004, he received the Ernst Reuter Medal of the City of Berlin. In 2003, he was awarded the Gold Medal of the Royal Philharmonic Society. He was elected Praemium Imperiale Laureate of the Japan Art Association and received the award of Italian music critics, “Franco Abbiati”. In 2006, Claudio Abbado received the Yehudi Menuhin Award in Spain. He has received honorary doctorates from the universities of Cambridge, Aberdeen, Ferrara and Basilicata.

Claudio Abbado died in Bologna on 20 January 2014.

As the inaugural Resident Conductor of the NACO, Kennedy covers and assists Music Director Alexander Shelley and others with rehearsals and concert preparation, and covers selected projects with the Montreal, Vancouver, and Toronto Symphony Orchestras. He has also helmed numerous NACO programs of his own during his tenure in Ottawa, including another Tosca in a concert performance; yearly collaborations with the American Composer’s Orchestra in their EarShot series, which develops relationships between composers and orchestras; and repertoire including Beethoven and Sibelius symphonies, Britten’s The Turn of the Screw, and a reading of a new opera by Canadian composer Ian Cusson. The post in Ottawa has also led to other regional projects, including a concert with the Ottawa Symphony Orchestra, a new production of Mozart’s The Magic Flute at Edmonton Opera, and new music readings with Symphony Nova Scotia.

Kennedy is especially adept at building lasting relationships with both conductors and institutions. Collaborating with artistic director Mariusz Kwiecień and music director Bassem Akiki during his tenure at Poland’s Wrocław Opera, he assisted on Le nozze di Figaro and Madama Butterfly and took charge of performances of Don Giovanni, Carmen, and Les Pêcheurs de perles. He also assisted Akiki for the world premiere of the late Belgian composer Philippe Boesmans’s On purge bébé! at The Royal Theatre of La Monnaie in Brussels. Kennedy was brought back in February 2024 to conduct Pêcheurs at Poland’s Silesian Opera in Bytom, then again to conduct La bohème in Wrocław the following year. He has been engaged to return yet again in 2027 for further performances of Pêcheurs. 

In orchestral repertoire, Kennedy has assumed responsibilities as assistant to Marin Alsop, Sir Mark Elder, Edward Gardner, Hannu Lintu, Jukka-Pekka Saraste, and John Storgårds. He served as assistant conductor to Sir John Eliot Gardiner and Orchestre Révolutionnaire et Romantique in 2023 for a concert tour of Berlioz’s Les Troyens, contributing to performances at La Côte-Saint-André’s Berlioz Festival, Salzburg Festival, Royal Opera of Versailles, Berliner Philharmonie, and BBC Proms, and returned to assist Gardiner again two years later when he conducted the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. In between those engagements, Kennedy served twice as assistant conductor to Sir Simon Rattle: first with the Czech Philharmonic in Prague, and then with the Bavarian Radio Orchestra in Munich. Kennedy has also enjoyed mentoring relationships with Christian Thielemann and Richard Bonynge, both of whom have continued to offer their enthusiastic support.

Kennedy’s relationship with Riccardo Muti is also ongoing: he was chosen in December 2021 as one of five conductors for the Riccardo Muti Italian Opera Academy, focusing on Nabucco and filmed in Milan by RAI. When Muti had unexpectedly to withdraw from two performances of Nabucco excerpts that month in Rimini and Ravenna, he invited Kennedy to be his replacement.

In recent seasons Kennedy has conducted a number of other orchestras across Europe, including the Polish Radio Orchestra, in a live broadcast of Mendelssohn’s “Scottish” Symphony; Poland’s Sudeten Philharmonic and Zielona Góra Philharmonic; and Romania’s Braşov Philharmonic. In 2017 in London he founded the Resonate Symphony Orchestra, drawn from recent graduates of leading British conservatories, and led the ensemble in repertoire ranging from Bach to Wagner, Bruckner, and Shostakovich.

Kennedy graduated with Distinction and Honours from London’s Royal Academy of Music, where he studied clarinet and piano in addition to conducting.