Klaus Mäkelä has been named Riccardo Muti's successor at the helm of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, a role he assumes in 2027 alongside the post of Chief Conductor of Amsterdam's Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra. Meanwhile, he remains committed to his two European orchestras, the Orchestre de Paris and the Oslo Philharmonic.

Following his Decca debut recording, of the complete Sibelius symphonies in Oslo, Mäkelä has made two much-admired recordings of music commissioned by Serge Diaghilev. The first of these, made with the Orchestre de Paris, was released early last year – Igor Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring and the complete Firebird ballet – and James Jolly spoke to the conductor by Zoom back in February 2023 as Klaus was in Cleveland conducting performances of Mahler's Fifth Symphony.

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