Kirill Petrenko has served as chief conductor and artistic director of the Berliner Philharmoniker since August 2019.

Most recently, he was General Music Director of Bayerische Staatsoper for seven years, after having served as Kapellmeister at the Wiener Volksoper (1997-1999), as well as General Music Director of both the Meininger Staatstheater (1999-2002) and the Komische Oper Berlin (2002-2007).

He has appeared as a guest conductor at the Wiener Staatsoper, the Semperoper in Dresden, the Royal Opera House Covent Garden in London, the Metropolitan Opera in New York and the Opéra Bastille in Paris. In 2013, he headed a new production of Wagner’s Ring of the Nibelungen at the Bayreuth Festival, which he conducted until 2015.

Alongside his work in the opera pit, he also developed a reputation as a conductor sought after by the world’s most important symphony orchestras. Among those orchestras he has led are the Wiener Philharmoniker, the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, the Staatskapelle Dresden, Leipzig’s Gewandhausorchester, the Frankfurter Museumsorchester, the WDR Sinfonieorchester Köln, the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester in Hamburg, the Radio-Sinfonieorchester Wien, the Wiener Symphoniker, the Royal Concertgebouworkest, the London Philharmonic, as well as the Cleveland Orchestra, the Chicago Symphony and the Los Angeles Philharmonic. Additionally, he has repeatedly performed as a guest conductor with the Israel Philharmonic, the RAI Orchestra in Turin, and the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia in Rome.

In the opening concert of his first season at the helm of the Berliner Philharmoniker, Petrenko conducted Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony – which served as a declaration of his intent to deeply engage with the core Classical-Romantic repertoire with which he intends to begin each season in the future. Unjustly neglected composers such as Josef Suk and Erich Wolfgang Korngold also play an important role in his concerts. In addition to key works of the 20th century, Petrenko has frequently conducted world premieres of symphonic works and operas, and he has also committed himself to contemporary music during his tenure in Berlin. For instance, following on from a work by Anna Thorvaldsdóttir, a number of further works have been commissioned from contemporary composers.

Petrenko is also dedicated to the training of young musicians and introducing young people to the diverse aspects of music, which has led him to direct projects for the Karajan Academy and concerts of the National Youth Orchestra of Germany.

At the Osterfestspiele in Baden-Baden, he will continue to conduct operas as well as concerts. In 2022, he attracted international attention to Baden-Baden as he led performances of Tchaikovsky’s The Queen of Spades and in 2023 Richard Strauss’ Die Frau ohne Schatten which he will follow up with Elektra in 2024. It was recently announced that the Berliner Philharmoniker will return to the Osterfestspiele to their original home in Salzburg under Petrenko’s musical direction.

Outside of Berlin, Petrenko can be seen on tour with the Berliner Philharmoniker at festival venues such as Salzburg and Lucerne and in various European music capitals. Last year he and the orchestra celebrated a triumphant tour of the USA (including Boston, Chicago and New York, among other cities), while his first tour to Asia with the Berliner is planned for Autumn 2023. Naturally, his work with the Berliner Philharmoniker can also be experienced in the Digital Concert Hall. Additionally, numerous recordings of repertoire ranging from Mozart to John Adams have been released on the Berliner Philharmoniker’s house label.

Photo (c) Wilfried Hösl