Dima Slobodeniouk & Seong-Jin Cho

Lauded for his deeply informed and intelligent artistic leadership, Dima Slobodeniouk has held the position of Music Director of the Orquesta Sinfónica
de Galicia since 2013, which he combines with his more recent positions as Principal Conductor of the Lahti Symphony Orchestra and Artistic Director of the Sibelius Festival following his appointment in 2016.

Linking his native Russian roots with the cultural influence of his later homeland Finland, he draws on the powerful musical heritage of these two countries. He works with orchestras such as the Berliner Philharmoniker, Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, London Philharmonic, London Symphony Orchestra, Finnish Radio Symphony, Chicago, Houston and Baltimore as well as Sydney Symphony Orchestras.

Summer 2018 sees Slobodeniouk give his debut with the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Joshua Bell at the Tanglewood Music Festival. Further highlights are his debuts with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra Amsterdam, Rotterdam Philharmonic, ORF Radio-Symphonieorchester Wien at the Musikverein, Bayerisches Staatsorchester Munich, Minnesota, Seattle and Milwaukee Symphony Orchestras, NHK Symphony Orchestra and Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra as well as West Australian Symphony Orchestra. He returns to WDR Sinfonieorchester Cologne with Yefim Bronfman, Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin, Dresdner Philharmonie, Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra, Finnish Radio Symphony, Helsinki Philharmonic and New Zealand Symphony Orchestras.

In Lahti, Slobodeniouk opens the 2018/19 season with Joseph Canteloupe’s Chants Auvergene and Beethoven’s Eroica Symphony, before he takes the orchestra on tour to China including Shanghai Arts Festival. In Galicia he launches the new season with Patricia Kopatchinskaja and Shostakovich Symphony No 11. Other soloists he works with include Nicolas Altstaedt, Leif Ove Andsnes, Khatia Buniatishvili, Vilde Frang, Vadim Gluzman, Johannes Moser, Baiba Skride, Simon Trpceski, Yuja Wang and Frank Peter Zimmermann.

Slobodeniouk’s discography was recently extended by recordings of works by Stravinsky with Ilya Gringolts and Orquesta Sinfónica de Galicia (BIS) and works by Aho with Lahti Symphony Orchestra (BIS), the latter received the BBC Music Magazine award 2018. He has previously recorded works by Lotta Wennäkoski with Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra (Ondine) and works by Sebastian Fagerlund with Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra (BIS).

Moscow-born Dima Slobodeniouk studied violin at Moscow Central Music School under Zinaida Gilels and J. Chugajev, the Middle Finland Conservatory as well as the Sibelius Academy under Olga Parhomenko. He continued his Sibelius Academy studies with Atso Almila also under the guidance of Leif Segerstam and Jorma Panula, and has also studied under Ilya Musin and Esa-Pekka Salonen. Striving to inspire young musicians of the future, Slobodeniouk has worked with students at the Verbier Festival Academy over recent years and furthermore began a conducting initiative with the Orquesta Sinfónica de Galicia, providing an opportunity for students to work on the podium with a professional orchestra.

With an overwhelming talent and innate musicality, Seong-Jin Cho has made his mark as one of the consummate talents of his generation and most distinctive artists on the current music scene. His thoughtful and poetic, assertive and tender, virtuosic and colourful playing can combine panache with purity and is driven by an impressive natural sense of balance.

Highlights of Seong-Jin Cho’s 2020/21 season include his return the Berliner Philharmoniker with Ivan Fischer and debuts with the Münchner Philharmoniker and Valery Gergiev. A highly sought-after touring soloist, Cho embarks on several international tours, including those with the Orchestre Philharmonique de Luxembourg and Gustavo Gimeno and the Budapest Festival Orchestra with Ivan Fischer. Recent and upcoming orchestral highlights include performances with the Los Angeles Philharmonic and Gustavo Dudamel, Boston Symphony Orchestra with Hannu Lintu, Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra with Manfred Honeck, Mahler Chamber Orchestra with Jakub Hrůša and the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra with Jaap Van Zweden.

An active recitalist very much in demand, Seong-Jin Cho performs in many of the world’s most prestigious concert halls including the main stage of Carnegie Hall as part of the Keyboard Virtuoso series, Concertgebouw Amsterdam in the Master Pianists series, Berliner Philharmonie Kammermusiksaal (Berliner Philharmoniker concert series), Konzerthaus Vienna, Suntory Hall Tokyo, Walt Disney Hall Los Angeles, Prinzregententheater Munich, Liederhalle Stuttgart, Festival International de piano de la Roque d’Anthéron, Verbier Festival, Gstaad Menuhin Festival and Rheingau Musik Festival. During the coming season he gives debut solo recitals at the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées Paris, Festspielhaus Bregenz, Victoria Hall Geneva and Wigmore Hall.

Born in 1994 in Seoul, Seong-Jin Cho started learning the piano at the age of six and gave his first public recital aged 11. In 2009, he became the youngest-ever winner of Japan’s Hamamatsu International Piano Competition. In 2011, he won Third Prize at the International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow at the age of 17. From 2012-2015 he studied with Michel Béroff at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Paris and is now based in Berlin.