Gerhard Oppitz｜Piano

Gerhard Oppitz’s international career began in 1977, when he became the first German pianist to win the Gold Medal at the Arthur Rubinstein International Piano Competition in Tel Aviv, with the 90-year-old Rubinstein himself serving on the jury. Concert tours throughout Europe, Japan and the United States followed, together with his first recordings. To date, Oppitz has made more than one hundred recordings.

In 1981, Oppitz was appointed Professor at the Hochschule für Musik und Theater München, a position he held until 2013. Over the course of his artistic career, he has collaborated with legendary conductors including Carlo Maria Giulini, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Sir Colin Davis, Zubin Mehta and Riccardo Muti. Many of these collaborations are documented in CD and video recordings.

Oppitz has repeatedly performed complete cycles of works in concert, including Bach’s The Well-Tempered Clavier, the complete sonatas of Beethoven, Schubert and Mozart, the piano works of Grieg and, above all, the complete piano works of Johannes Brahms. He has performed the complete Brahms sonata cycle in Europe, the United States and Japan, and presented eleven full programmes of Schubert’s solo works at the Rheingau Music Festival.

In 1990, he completed a recording of the complete piano works of Brahms. In 1993, he recorded Brahms’s two piano concertos with Sir Colin Davis and released a complete edition of Edvard Grieg’s piano works. Between 1995 and 1996, he recorded the complete Beethoven piano concertos with the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra under Marek Janowski. In 1997, he again collaborated with Sir Colin Davis and the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra on a complete recording of Carl Maria von Weber’s works for piano and orchestra. Recent releases include sonatas by Beethoven and Schubert, a recording of Japanese piano music and the complete piano works of Robert Schumann.

In 2009, Oppitz received the Brahms Prize from the Brahms Society Schleswig-Holstein, previously awarded to Leonard Bernstein and Yehudi Menuhin. Since 2014, he has also been a recipient of the Maximilian Order for Science and Art, the highest honour bestowed by the State of Bavaria.

Edward Gardner｜Conductor

“A conducting force to be reckoned with” (The New York Times), leading British conductor Edward Gardner is Principal Conductor of the London Philharmonic Orchestra and Music Director of the Norwegian Opera and Ballet. He is also Honorary Conductor of the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra and a three-time Gramophone Award winner.

Gardner is active on both the symphonic and operatic stages, conducting leading ensembles and opera houses including the New York Philharmonic, Staatskapelle Berlin, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Philadelphia Orchestra, Cleveland Orchestra, Teatro alla Scala and the Royal Opera House.

He served as Music Director of English National Opera from 2007 to 2015 and has maintained strong relationships with the Metropolitan Opera, Bavarian State Opera, Glyndebourne Festival Opera, Opéra National de Paris and Teatro alla Scala.

Gardner has made numerous acclaimed recordings, including Tippett’s The Midsummer Marriage, Britten’s Peter Grimes, Wagner’s Der fliegende Holländer, Richard Strauss’s Salome and Tania León’s Raíces (Origins).

A passionate supporter of young talent, Gardner founded Manchester’s Hallé Youth Orchestra in 2002. In 2014, he was appointed the inaugural Sir Charles Mackerras Conducting Chair at the Royal Academy of Music. His honours include the Royal Philharmonic Society’s Conductor of the Year Award, an Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievement in Opera, the Sibelius Prize and an OBE for Services to Music.

London Philharmonic Orchestra

Founded in 1932, the London Philharmonic Orchestra is recognised as one of the world’s leading orchestras, celebrated for its artistic excellence, versatility, invention and inclusivity.

The orchestra’s home is the Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall. It also performs regularly in Brighton, Eastbourne and Saffron Walden, as well as on tour worldwide. For more than 60 years, the London Philharmonic Orchestra has been the Resident Symphony Orchestra at Glyndebourne Festival Opera.

The orchestra has accompanied many memorable moments in modern cultural history, from performing national anthems at the medal ceremonies of the London Olympic and Paralympic Games, to its iconic recording with Pavarotti of Nessun Dorma. It has also featured on major film soundtracks, including The Lord of the Rings.

The orchestra’s Principal Conductors have included Sir Adrian Boult, Bernard Haitink, Klaus Tennstedt and Kurt Masur. Edward Gardner became its 13th Principal Conductor in 2021. Vladimir Jurowski is Conductor Emeritus, Karina Canellakis is Principal Guest Conductor and Sir George Benjamin is Composer-in-Residence.

The LPO is committed to nurturing the next generation of musicians and music lovers through concerts, workshops, teaching resources and training programmes. Its OrchLab and Open Sound Ensemble projects create music-making opportunities for people with disabilities and special educational needs.

The 2026/27 season is themed “In Search of Purpose”, featuring Britten’s War Requiem, Stravinsky’s The Firebird, Elgar’s The Dream of Gerontius and George Benjamin’s opera Lessons in Love and Violence. The orchestra will also tour China, Spain, Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and the Canary Islands.