Kirill Petrenko conducts Korngold, Mozart and Norman

Kirill Petrenko has been chief conductor and artistic director of the Berliner Philharmoniker since the 2019/20 season. Born in Omsk in Siberia, he received his training first in his home town and later in Austria. He established his conducting career in opera with positions at the Meininger Theater and the Komische Oper Berlin. From 2013 to 2020, Kirill Petrenko was general music director of Bayerische Staatsoper. He has also made guest appearances at the world’s leading opera houses, including Wiener Staatsoper, Covent Garden in London, the Opéra national in Paris, the Metropolitan Opera in New York and at the Bayreuth Festival. Moreover, he has conducted the major international symphony orchestras – in Vienna, Munich, Dresden, Paris, Amsterdam, London, Rome, Chicago, Cleveland and Israel. Since his debut in 2006, a variety of programmatic themes have emerged in his work together with the Berliner Philharmoniker. These include work on the orchestra’s core Classical-Romantic repertoire, most notably with Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony when he took up his post. Unjustly forgotten composers such as Josef Suk and Erich Wolfgang Korngold are another of Kirill Petrenko’s interests. Russian works are also highlighted, with performances of Tchaikovsky’s operas Mazeppa, Iolanta and The Queen of Spades attracting particular attention recently.

Noah Bendix-Balgley performs on one of the few violins from the Cremonese workshop of Carlo Bergonzi – an instrument that enables him to share his “thoughts and emotions with other musicians and the audience”. Noah Bendix-Balgley’s life-long goal is to produce a sound that is not only beautiful but also expressive and connects with listeners in a meaningful way. The violinist, a native of North Carolina, was concertmaster of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra from 2011 to 2015, then joined the Berliner Philharmoniker as first concertmaster. Noah Bendix-Balgley appears as a soloist with leading orchestras throughout the world – naturally, also in concerts with the Berliner Philharmoniker. An avid chamber musician, he performs in several fixed ensembles, including the trio with pianist Robert Levin and cellist Peter Wiley and the multi-genre septet Philharmonix featuring members of the Berliner Philharmoniker and the Vienna Philharmonic. Noah Bendix-Balgley is also an enthusiastic interpreter of traditional klezmer music, appearing with such world-famous klezmer ensembles as Brave Old World. He has taught klezmer workshops throughout Europe and the United States and has composed a klezmer violin concerto, Fidl-Fantazye, which will be presented in the Philharmonie Berlin in April 2023.