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Conductor |
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Olari Elts |
Biography – about the artist.
Music Director and Chief Conductor Estonian National Symphony Orchestra
Olari Elts’ passion for distinctive programming rich with invention has earned him much praise on the international music scene. He began his tenure as Music Director and Chief Conductor of the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra in 2020. He was also Artistic Advisor of the Kymi Sinfonietta from 2018-2022.
Elts has appeared as guest conductor with renowned orchestras, such as Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Danish National Symphony, Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra, Radio Filharmonisch Orkest, BBC Symphony Orchestra, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Orchestre National de France, Orchestre National de Lyon, Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg, Budapest Festival Orchestra, Orchestre symphonique de Québec, Yomiuri Nippon Symphony Orchestra, Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra, and Melbourne Symphony Orchestra.
Soloists with whom he enjoys collaborating, include Gautier Capuçon, Renaud Capuçon, Brett Dean, Isabelle Faust, Alban Gerhardt, Martin Grubinger, Martin Helmchen, Stephen Hough, Lucas & Arthur Jussen, Kari Kriikku, Karita Mattila, Alexander Melnikov, Daniel Lozakovich, Baiba Skride, Simon Trpčeski, and Antoine Tamestit.
In the 2024/25 season, Elts makes his return to the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra in an intricate programme of works by Mendelssohn, Ernest Pingoud, Peter Maxwell Davies, and the world premiere of Federico Perotti’s new organ concerto. Further returns this season include engagements with Staatskapelle Weimar, Sinfonietta Rīga, and Oulu Sinfonia, where Elts conducts works by Part, Ravel, Sibelius, Strauss, Stravinsky, and Tchaikovsky. Elsewhere, Elts makes his debut at the New Music Dublin Festival with National Symphony Orchestra and a programme of new works by Unsuk Chin and John Buckley. He will also make his debuts with the Taipei and Xi'an Symphony Orchestras, join the Sibelius Academy Symphony Orchestra at the invitation of Sakari Oramo, and lead the Tiroler Symphonieorchester Innsbruck in Austria. Besides his subscription concerts with the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra in Tallinn, Elts revives their acclaimed semi-staged production of ‘Macbeth’ in collaboration with the Estonian Drama Theatre, and following recent successful international tours in the UK, Germany and France, they will close the 2024/25 season on tour in Finland.
As a champion of contemporary Baltic composers, Elts has released recordings of Heino Eller’s Symphonic Poems, as well as his violin concerto with Baiba Skride and the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra. Also widely celebrated by critics are his Ondine recordings of Erkki-Sven Tüür works with Tapiola Sinfonietta, including the viola concerto with Lawrence Power, Tüür’s Symphony No. 5, and the accordion concerto ‘Prophecy’ with the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra. His 2016 recording of Brahms’ arrangements (Glanert, Berio) with the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra also received high praise. Elts’ discography includes the Borgström and Shostakovich violin concertos with Eldbjørg Hemsing and the Wiener Symphoniker as well as recent releases with music by Kalevi Aho recorded with the Antwerp Symphony Orchestra and the Kymi Sinfonietta, under the BIS label. His latest recording project is a new album with music by award-winning Norwegian composer Øyvind Torvund in collaboration with the Olso Philharmonic Orchestra.
Elts has also made his mark in opera, having conducted titles such as ‘Eugene Onegin’, Mozart’s ‘Don Giovanni’ and ‘Idomeneo’, and Berlioz’s ‘La Damnation du Faust’. Crossing genres, Elts toured to the Konzerthaus Berlin with the theatre-concert production which combined Mendelssohn and Shakespeare’s ‘Midsummer Night’s Dream’ with the Tallinn-based theatre company NO99. For Bernstein’s 100th anniversary, Elts conducted the film ‘On the Waterfront’ with Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg.
Olari Elts was Principal Guest Conductor of the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra from 2007-2020 and held the same position at Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra from 2011-2014. He was Artistic Advisor of the Orchestre National de Bretagne from 2006-2011, Principal Guest Conductor of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra from 2007-2010, and Chief Conductor of the Latvian National Symphony Orchestra from 2001-2006.
Season 2024/2025
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Picture Gallery
Olari Elts © Katrin Viil
Olari Elts @ Kaupo Kikkas
Olari Elts © Krõõt Tarkmeel
Olari Elts @ Kaupo Kikkas
Olari Elts © Katrin Viil
Olari Elts @ Kaupo Kikkas
Olari Elts @ Kaupo Kikkas
Olari Elts © Krõõt Tarkmeel
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Discography.
Press.
„Olari Elts made an impressive return as guest conductor with the Tasmanian Symphony Orchestra in this highly successful program. The conductor brought energy and focussed textures to bear on Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 9 in E flat, Op. 70. His identification with this music seemed total and felt very idiomatic. Elts made the listener very aware of the troubled underbelly of the outwardly jokey and sarcastic tone of much of the piece.“
„Even by the benchmarks set in recent interpretations by Finnish conductors, this Sibelius Fifth was a beacon of vitality. Elts has plenty of febrile energy, but never rushes, and knows how to make the big cloudbursts work. The performance also included the most striking take on the central movement I've ever heard […] the dynamics, tempo fluctuations and unexpected colourings of this one were startling in a good way throughout.“
„Dvořák’s restless Symphony no. 7 in D minor was a true showcase for the Estonians, who gave a terrific performance. Elts conjured a world of darkness and light with big clear flowing gestures […] In an organic performance, Elts allowed the music to breathe through the elegant dance with dark undercurrents, ahead of the epic final chords in a winning performance.“
„The conductor Olari Elts clearly has the measure of them, and most obviously an ear for how best to draw out the detail of the intriguing colours Tüür manages to extract from both soloists and orchestra.“
„Conducting without a baton, Estonian Olari Elts’ precise, restrained approach conjured a touching austere beauty from the players. […] It was fascinating to follow Vasks’ composition for the orchestra, each individual section receiving a share of the limelight, carefully guided by Elts, breathing as one with the music. […] Bright woodwinds brought colour to the moderate duo before the piccolo and clarinet led the dancing with Elts keeping everything light and sprightly before the variations on Simple Gifts and bringing a calm and flowing beauty right to the delicate raindrops at the end.“
„Elts’ conducting can be flamboyant at the same time as being meticulously precise. [...] The result in Rachmaninov’s Symphonic Dances had intensity and color, decisiveness and vigor, allied with the same sensitivity which pervaded the Rhapsody, plus fine work from the alto saxophone in the first movement.“
„There’s an irresistible energy and joy in Elts’ conducting style; he leaps about the podium, sweeping his arms and hands in enthusiastic but exquisitely clear, focused gestures. His gift for revealing inner structures gave the symphony a fresh, living dimensionality.“