David Robertson – conductor, composer, artist, thinker and American musical visionary – occupies some of the most prominent platforms on the international music scene. A highly sought-after podium figure in the worlds of opera, orchestral music and new music, Robertson is celebrated worldwide as a champion of contemporary composers, an ingenious and adventurous programmer and a masterful communicator whose passionate advocacy for the art form is widely recognized. A consummate and deeply collaborative musician, Robertson is hailed for his intensely committed music making.

In the 2025-26 season, David Robertson deepens his commitment to inspiring the world’s greatest orchestras and the next generation of musical artists. He will return to conduct the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra for the first time since the culmination of his tenure as music director. In St. Louis’s newly renovated Powell Hall, he will lead Leonard Bernstein’s Symphony No.2, The Age of Anxiety; the first SLSO performances of Sarah Kirkland Snider’s Something for the Dark and his own composition Light forming – a piano concerto with Orli Shaham; and Steven Mackey’s Turn the Key. Robertson will make his second post-chief conductorship visit to the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, leading performances of Nielsen’s Symphony No.4, The Inextinguishable, and Beethoven’s Violin Concerto with Gil Shaham.

2025-26 is David Robertson’s eighth academic year as Director of Conducting Studies, Distinguished Visiting Faculty of The Juilliard School in New York, as he continues his role as a member of the Tianjin Juilliard Advisory Council, an international body created to guide Juilliard’s Chinese campus. He conducts the Juilliard Orchestra at Carnegie Hall in February 2026.

David Robertson will return to the New York Philharmonic to lead the world premiere of Caroline Mallonee’s Lakeside Game, co-commissioned as part of the orchestra’s Project 19; Wynton Marsalis’s Violin Concerto with Nicola Benedetti; and Stravinsky’s Petrushka. Robertson conducts a number of other North American orchestras throughout the season, including the Dallas Symphony Orchestra with Emanuel Ax, Nashville Symphony with Orli Shaham performing Robertson’s Light forming, the National Symphony in Washington, DC with Orli Shaham and Gil Shaham performing the world premiere of Reena Esmail’s Double Concerto (to be reprised at the Aspen Music Festival and School), and the Vancouver Symphony performing works by John Adams and Nielsen and Alex Robertson’s Modum. He will conclude his three-year tenure as Creative Partner of the Utah Symphony with three visits in October, February and May, with a wide range of music and guest artists.

In Europe, Robertson returns to the Leipzig Gewandhausorchester with Kirill Gerstein performing Stravinsky’s Concerto for Piano and Winds and Ravel’s Concerto for the Left Hand with works by Arvo Pärt and Bernstein. With the Budapest Festival Orchestra and guest artist harpist Xavier de Maistre, he conducts works by Ligeti, Ginastera and Nielsen, and works by John Adams and Bartók with the HR-Sinfonieorchester at the Alte Oper Frankfurt with pianists Lucas and Arthur Jussen. Robertson returns to the Czech Philharmonic with works by Smetana, Beethoven and Stravinsky, and pianist Seong-Jin Cho. In Asia, David Robertson will return to the Hong Kong Philharmonic making his debut at the Hong Kong Arts Festival, Tongyeong International Music Festival in Korea, and to Kaohsiung for the Taiwan Festival.

Robertson appears with many major ensembles and festivals on five continents, including: the New York Philharmonic, The Philadelphia Orchestra, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Boston Symphony Orchestra, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, The Cleveland Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, Dallas Symphony Orchestra, Houston Symphony, Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, Utah Symphony, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre symphonique de Montréal, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Czech Philharmonic, Berliner Philharmoniker, Leipzig Gewandhausorchester, Wiener Philharmoniker, NDR Elbphilharmonieorchester, Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin, the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunk, Staatskapelle Dresden, São Paulo State Symphony Orchestra, Sydney Symphony Orchestra, Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra, the New Japan Philharmonic, the China NCPA Orchestra, Taiwan National Symphony Orchestra; and at the Lucerne Festival, Berlin Festival, the Edinburgh Festival, the BBC Proms, Musica Viva Festival in Munich, the Aspen Music Festival and School, Music Academy of the West, Tongyeong International Music Festival, and Taiwan’s Kaohsiung Festival, among others.

David Robertson completed his transformative 13-year tenure as Music Director of the St. Louis Symphony Orchestra in 2018, where he solidified the orchestra’s status as one of the nation’s most enduring and innovative, and reinvigorated its American and European presence through regular touring programs. For the SLSO, he created dynamic relationships with a wide spectrum of artists, and garnered a 2014 Grammy Award, Best Orchestral Performance, for the Nonesuch release of John Adams’ City Noir. Among many other recordings, the historic Robertson-SLSO association, included the 2019 Blue Engine Records release of Wynton Marsalis’ Swing Symphony, with the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra. 2019 was David Robertson’s valedictory season as Chief Conductor and Artistic Director of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra, the culmination of a six-year tenure leading the top orchestra of the southern hemisphere.

Building upon his prolific association with The Metropolitan Opera, Robertson conducted the encore performances in Fall 2021 of James Robinson’s lauded 2019 production of The Gershwins’ Porgy and Bess, which featured the returns of Eric Owens and Angel Blue in the lead roles. Robertson’s musical leadership of the 2019-20 season Porgy and Bess production premiere was honoured at the 63rd Grammy Awards, in March 2021, as Best Opera Recording. Preceding this rich success, Robertson’s deep relationship with the Met Opera includes the premiere of Phelim McDermott’s celebrated 2018 production of Così fan tutte, set in 1950s Coney Island, and, since his Met debut in 1996 with The Makropulos Case, he has conducted a breathtaking range of Met projects, including the 2014 Met premiere of John Adams’ The Death of Klinghoffer; the 2016 revival of Janáček’s Jenůfa, then its first Met performances in nearly a decade; the premiere production of Nico Muhly’s Two Boys (2013); and many favourites, from Mozart’s Le Nozze di Figaro to Britten’s Billy Budd. Robertson conducts projects at the world’s most prestigious opera houses, including La Scala, Théâtre du Châtelet, Bayerische Staatsoper, the San Francisco Opera and the Santa Fe Opera. In January 2022, David Robertson made his debut with the Rome Opera conducting Janáček’s Káťa Kabanová to great critical acclaim.

In addition to Sydney and St. Louis, Robertson has served in artistic leadership positions at musical institutions including the Orchestre National de Lyon, and, as a protégé of Pierre Boulez, the Ensemble Intercontemporain, which he led on an extensive North American tour. At the BBC Symphony Orchestra, he served as Principal Guest Conductor. Robertson has served as a Perspectives Artist at Carnegie Hall, where he has conducted, among others, The Met Orchestra, Lucerne Festival Orchestra, St. Louis Symphony Orchestra and The Juilliard Orchestra.

Robertson is the recipient of numerous musical and artistic awards and in 2010 was made a Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres by the Government of France. In addition to his Juilliard roles, he is devoted to supporting young musicians and has worked with students at the festivals of Aspen, Tanglewood, Lucerne, at the Paris Conservatoire, Music Academy of the West and the National Orchestra Institute. In 2014, he led the Coast to Coast US tour of Carnegie Hall’s National Youth Orchestra of the USA.

Born in Santa Monica, California, David Robertson was educated at London’s Royal Academy of Music, where he studied horn and composition before turning to orchestral conducting. He is married to pianist Orli Shaham, and lives in New York.

Gil Shaham is one of the foremost violinists of our time; his flawless technique combined with his inimitable warmth and generosity of spirit has solidified his renown as an American master. The Grammy Award-winner, also named Musical America’s Instrumentalist of the Year, is sought after throughout the world for concerto appearances with leading orchestras and conductors, and regularly gives recitals and appears with ensembles on the world’s great concert stages and at the most prestigious festivals.

Highlights of recent years include the acclaimed recording and performances of JS Bach’s complete sonatas and partitas for solo violin. In the coming seasons in addition to championing these solo works he will join his long-time duo partner, pianist Akira Eguchi, in recitals throughout North America, Europe, and Asia.

Appearances with orchestra regularly include the Berlin Philharmonic, Boston Symphony, Chicago Symphony, Israel Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, Orchestre de Paris and San Francisco Symphony as well as multi-year residencies with the Orchestras of Montreal, Stuttgart and Singapore. With orchestra, Mr. Shaham continues his exploration of Violin Concertos of the 1930s, including the works of Barber, Bartok, Berg, Korngold, Prokofiev, among many others.

Mr. Shaham has more than two dozen concerto and solo CDs to his name, earning multiple Grammys, a Grand Prix du Disque, Diapason d’Or, and Gramophone Editor’s Choice. Many of these recordings appear on Canary Classics, the label he founded in 2004. His CDs include 1930s Violin Concertos, Virtuoso Violin Works, Elgar’s Violin Concerto, Hebrew Melodies, The Butterfly Lovers and many more. His most recent recording in the series, 1930s Violin Concertos Vol.2, including Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto and Bartok’s Violin Concerto No.2, was nominated for a Grammy Award. He released a recording of Beethoven and Brahms Concertos with The Knights in 2020.

Mr. Shaham was born in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, in 1971. He moved with his parents to Israel, where he began violin studies with Samuel Bernstein of the Rubin Academy of Music at the age of seven, receiving annual scholarships from the America-Israel Cultural Foundation. In 1981, he made debuts with the Jerusalem Symphony and the Israel Philharmonic and the following year, took the first prize in Israel’s Claremont Competition. He then became a scholarship student at Juilliard and also studied at Columbia University.

Gil Shaham was awarded an Avery Fisher Career Grant in 1990, and in 2008 he received the coveted Avery Fisher Prize. In 2012, he was named Instrumentalist of the Year by Musical America. He plays the 1699 “Countess Polignac” Stradivarius and performs on an Antonio Stradivari violin, Cremona c.1719, with the assistance of Rare Violins In Consortium, Artists and Benefactors Collaborative. He lives in New York City with his wife, violinist Adele Anthony, and their three children.