Petr Popelka & Pierre-Laurent Aimard

Within a very short time, Petr Popelka has made a name for himself as one of the most inspiring conductors of his generation. The Czech has been Chief Conductor and Artistic Director of the Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra since the 2022/2023 season and Chief Conductor of the Norwegian Radio Orchestra in Oslo since August 2020.

In the 2022/2023 season, he will make his debut with the Gewandhaus Orchestra, Staatskapelle Berlin, Bamberg Symphony Orchestra, SWR Symphony Orchestra, WDR Symphony Orchestra, Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin, Orchestra sinfonica nazionale della RAI, Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg, and Atlanta Symphony Orchestra, among others, and return to the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden, Vienna Symphony Orchestra (TV concert “Spring in Vienna”), Danish National Symphony Orchestra, and Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra. A new production of Strauss’ “Elektra” takes him to the Oslo Opera and Shostakovich’s “Nose” back to the Semperoper Dresden. Together with his orchestras from Prague and Oslo, he will also perform Schoenberg’s monumental “Gurre-Lieder.” Previous debuts have taken him to the Czech Philharmonic, NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchester, hr-Sinfonieorchester, Deutsche Radio Philharmonie and Mozarteumorchester Salzburg, among others.

In the 2019/2020 season, Petr Popelka was the first Conductor Fellow of the NDR Elbphilharmonie Orchestra. He received important conducting impulses from Vladimir Kiradjiev and Alan Gilbert, having devoted more time to conducting since 2016. He received his musical education in his hometown Prague and in Freiburg. From 2010 to 2019, he was deputy principal double bass of the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden. In addition to conducting, composing occupies an important position in Petr Popelka’s artistic work.

“A brilliant musician and an extraordinary visionary” (Wall Street Journal), Pierre-Laurent Aimard is widely acclaimed as an authority on music of our time while also recognised for shedding fresh light on music of the past.

In the 2025/26 season, Pierre-Laurent celebrates the 100th birthday of his longtime friend and collaborator György Kurtág with recitals at the Budapest Music Centre, Philharmonie Luxembourg and as part of his residency with Madrid’s Centro Nacional de Difusión Musical. J. S. Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier Vol.2 also constitutes a programme mainstay throughout the season surrounding the release of the album in October 2025, which follows 11 years after the success of Vol.1. Scheduled performances include Concertgebouw Amsterdam, London’s Southbank Centre, Konzerthaus Dortmund, Stockholm Konzerthaus, Seattle Benaroya Hall, Chamber Music Detroit and Boston Celebrity Series. Aimard’s extensive recital schedule also includes the Louvre, NTCH Taipei, NCPA Beijing and Shanghai Concert Hall. With orchestra, Aimard makes solo appearances across the season with the New York Philharmonic, Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin, Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, Stuttgart Kammerorchester, Hamburg Symphoniker, NDR Radiophilharmonie, Concerto Budapest, Barcelona Symphony Orchestra, Orquestra Sinfônica do Estado de São Paulo, Westdeutscher Rundfunk, Singapore Symphony and Seoul Philharmonic.

Aimard has enjoyed close collaborations with leading composers, including Helmut Lachenmann, Elliott Carter, Harrison Birtwistle, György Kurtág, Karlheinz Stockhausen, Marco Stroppa and Olivier Messiaen, and given many notable premieres; most recently DIVISONS for four hands by George Benjamin at Berlin’s Boulez Saal, which he repeats in the 2025/26 season at 92NY, the Library of Congress in Washington, and London’s Wigmore Hall. He also continues his associations with regular chamber music partners, most notably Isabelle Faust, Jörg Widmann and Jean-Guihen Queyras, touring Amsterdam’s Muziekgebouw, Kölner Philharmonie, Konzerthaus Wien, Elbphilharmonie Hamburg, and Madrid’s Auditorio Nacional with Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time.

In 2025 Aimard released Kurtág: Játékok. The latest in a series of critically acclaimed collaborations with Pentatone, it was awarded five stars by BBC Music Magazine. It follows Schubert: Ländler (2024), the complete Bartók Piano Concertos with Esa-Pekka Salonen and San Francisco Symphony Orchestra (2023), Visions de l’Amen (2022) recorded with Tamara Stefanovich, Beethoven’s Hammerklavier Sonata & Eroica Variations (2021), and Messiaen’s magnum opus Catalogue d’oiseaux (2018), which garnered multiple awards, including the German Record Critics’ Award.

Aimard is widely recognised as an innovative curator and uniquely significant interpreter of piano repertoire from every age. Previous residencies include the complete cycle of Beethoven’s piano concertos for Musikkollegium Winterthur and ground-breaking projects at Porto’s Casa da Musica, New York’s Carnegie Hall and Lincoln Center, Konzerthaus Vienna, Alte Oper Frankfurt, Lucerne Festival, Mozarteum Salzburg, Cité de la Musique in Paris, Tanglewood Festival, the Edinburgh Festival, and as Artistic Director of the Aldeburgh Festival from 2009 to 2016.

The recipient of many prizes, Aimard was awarded the prestigious International Ernst von Siemens Music Prize in 2017 in recognition of a life devoted to the service of music and the Leonie Sonning Music Prize, Denmark’s most prominent music award in 2022. A member of the Bayerische Akademie der Schönen Künste, Aimard has held professorships at the Hochschule Köln and was previously an Associate Professor at the College de France, Paris. In spring 2020, he re-launched a major online resource in collaboration with the Klavier-Festival Ruhr, Explore the Score, which centres on the performance and teaching of Ligeti’s piano music.