Dima Slobodeniouk & Javier Perianes

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.

The international career of Javier Perianes has led him to perform in the most prestigious concert halls, with the world’s foremost orchestras, working with celebrated conductors including Daniel Barenboim, Charles Dutoit, Zubin Mehta, Gustavo Dudamel, Klaus Mäkelä, Gianandrea Noseda, Gustavo Gimeno, Santtu-Matias Rouvali, Simone Young, Vladimir Jurowski, and François-Xavier Roth.

The 2023/24 season features an array of high-profile concerts including the US and Canadian premieres of Jimmy López Bellido’s Ephemerae with The Philadelphia Orchestra and Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, and the world premiere of a new concerto by Francisco Coll with London Philharmonic Orchestra and the Canadian premiere with Toronto Symphony Orchestra. Other highlights include Royal Concertgebouworkest, Orquesta Nacional de España, Brussels Philharmonic, NDR Radio Philharmonie, Norrkoping Symphony Orchestra, Iceland Symphony, Bern Symphonieorchester, and play/directing Orchestre de Chambre de Paris, Orquesta Ciudad de Granada, Franz Liszt Chamber Orchestra and Orquesta Sinfonica del Principado de Asturias. Perianes’ Beethoven cycle with Sydney Symphony Orchestra continues in summer 2024 with Beethoven Piano Concerto No. 1.

Perianes frequently appears in recital across the globe, with performances in Bilbao, Frankfurt, Regensburg, Canary Island Festival, San Francisco, Montreal and Vancouver this season. A natural and keen chamber musician, he is regularly collaborating with violist Tabea Zimmermann and Quiroga Quartet, and appearing at festivals such as the BBC Proms, Lucerne, Argerich Festival, Salzburg Whitsun, La Roque d’Anthéron, Grafenegg, Prague Spring, Ravello, Stresa, San Sebastian, Santander, Granada, Vail, Blossom, Ravinia and Canary Island. This season sees Perianes and Zimmermann tour to Boulez Saal, SPOT Groningen and Heidelberg Festival.

Career highlights have included concerts with Wiener Philhamoniker, Leipzig Gewandhausorchester, Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, Washington’s National, Yomiuri Nippon and Danish National symphony orchestras, Oslo, London, New York, Los Angeles and Czech philharmonic orchestras, Orchestre de Paris, Cleveland, Orchestre Symphonique de Montréal and Philharmonia orchestras, Swedish and Norwegian Radio orchestras, Mahler Chamber Orchestra and Budapest Festival Orchestra.

Recording exclusively for harmonia mundi, Perianes has developed a diverse discography ranging from Beethoven, Mendelssohn, Schubert, Grieg, Chopin, Debussy, Ravel and Bartók to Blasco de Nebra, Mompou, Falla, Granados and Turina. The 2020/21 season saw the release of Jeux de Miroirs and Cantilena. Jeux de Miroirs centres around Ravel’s Concerto in G recorded with Orchestre de Paris and Josep Pons and includes the piano and orchestral versions of Le tombeau de Couperin and Alborada del gracioso. Together with Tabea Zimmerman, he released Cantilena in April 2020, an album which is a celebration of music from Spanish and Latin America. His other recent albums pay tribute to Claude Debussy on the centenary of his death with a recording of the first book of his Préludes and Estampes, and Les Trois Sonates – The Late Works (with Jean-Guihen Queyras), which won a Gramophone Award in 2019. In July 2021 Perianes released his latest album featuring Chopin’s Sonatas No.2 and No.3 interspersed with the three Mazurkas from Op.63.

Perianes was awarded the National Music Prize in 2012 by the Ministry of Culture of Spain and named Artist of the Year at the International Classical Music Awards (ICMA) in 2019.