The 26/27 season marks Joshua Weilerstein’s third season as Music Director of the Orchestre National de Lille and fourth as Chief Conductor of the Aalborg Symphony Orchestra. Acclaimed for passionate performances that balance clarity and emotional depth, he is a compelling advocate for both the classical canon, the music of today and forgotten composers of the past.

This season Weilerstein takes the Orchestre National de Lille to the renowned La Chaise Dieu festival for two concerts and back to the Paris Philharmonie for a performance of Bizet’s The Pearlfishers. He also renews collaborations with soloists such as Alexandre Kantorow, Martin Fröst and Baibe Skride and explores some of the most important symphonic repertoire, including the Rite of Spring, Mahler’s 1st Symphony, and Scriabin’s Poem of Ecstasy. In Aalborg Weilerstein continues his popular live podcast series with the orchestra, as well as collaborating with Andreas Brantelid and Eldborg Hemsing, and he will open the season with the World Premiere by the Greenlandic composer Arnannguaq Gerstrøm. Elsewhere in 26/27 highlights include his return to the Dresden Staatskapelle, Royal Liverpool Philharmonic, BBC Symphony, San Diego Symphony and Indianapolis orchestras and debuts with the Gulbenkian and Netherlands Radio Philharmonic orchestras amongst others.

Weilerstein has conducted many of the world’s top orchestras, including in more recent seasons the Bavarian Radio Symphony in a televised performance of Shostakovich’s 5th symphony, Dresden Staatskapelle, London Philharmonic, BBC Philharmonic both in Manchester and at the BBC Proms, Royal Stockholm Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony, National Symphony and New York Philharmonic orchestras. He regularly collaborates with leading soloists such as Emanuel Ax, Yo-Yo Ma, Vilde Frang and Matthias Goerne. From 2015–2021, he was Artistic Director of the Orchestre de Chambre de Lausanne with whom he recorded the complete Beethoven symphonies and a disc of 20th and 21st century works by Ives, Ethel Smyth, William Grant Still and Caroline Shaw.

Born into a musical family, Weilerstein’s commitment to classical music was inspired by his experience on a youth orchestra tour to Central America, during which he performed for audiences that had never heard a live orchestra. He studied violin and conducting at the New England Conservatory and in 2009 won both the First and Audience Prizes at the Malko Competition in Copenhagen. He later served as Assistant Conductor of the New York Philharmonic from 2012–2015.

In 2017, inspired by Leonard Bernstein’s musical evangelism, Weilerstein launched the podcast Sticky Notes, which now reaches listeners in 190 countries and has been downloaded over eight million times.

Curiosity, diversity and a firm focus on the music itself characterize the artistic work of Jean-Guihen Queyras.

Whether on stage or on record, one experiences an artist dedicated completely and passionately to the music, whose humble and quite unpretentious treatment of the score reflects its clear, undistorted essence. The inner motivations of composer, performer and audience must all be in tune with one another in order to bring about an outstanding concert experience: Jean-Guihen Queyras learnt this interpretative approach from Pierre Boulez, with whom he established a long artistic partnership. This philosophy, alongside a flawless technique and a clear, engaging tone, also shapes Jean-Guihen Queyras’s approach to every performance and his absolute commitment to the music itself.

His approaches to early music – as in his collaborations with the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra and the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin – and to contemporary music are equally thorough. He has given world premieres of works by, among others, Ivan Fedele, Gilbert Amy, Bruno Mantovani, Michael Jarrell, Johannes-Maria Staud, Thomas Larcher and Tristan Murail. Conducted by the composer, he recorded Peter Eötvös’ Cello Concerto to mark his 70th birthday in November 2014.

Jean-Guihen Queyras was a founding member of the Arcanto Quartet and forms a celebrated trio with Isabelle Faust and Alexander Melnikov; the latter is, alongside Alexandre Tharaud, a regular accompanist. He has also collaborated with zarb specialists Bijan and Keyvan Chemirani on a Mediterranean program. The versatility in his music-making has led to many concert halls, festivals and orchestras inviting Jean-Guihen to be Artist in Residence, including the Concertgebouw Amsterdam and the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, Vredenburg Utrecht, De Bijloke Ghent and the Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg.

Jean-Guihen Queyras often appears with renowned orchestras such as the Philadelphia Orchestra, the Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, the Orchestre de Paris, the Residentie Orkest Den Haag, the London Symphony Orchestra, the Gewandhausorchester and the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, working with conductors such as Iván Fischer, Philippe Herreweghe, Yannick Nézet-Séguin, François-Xavier Roth, Sir John Eliot Gardiner and Sir Roger Norrington.

Jean-Guihen Queyras’s discography is impressive. His recordings of cello concertos by Edward Elgar, Antonín Dvořák, Philippe Schoeller and Gilbert Amy have been released to critical acclaim. As part of a harmonia mundi project dedicated to Schumann, he has recorded the complete piano trios with Isabelle Faust and Alexander Melnikov and at the same time the Schumann cello concerto with the Freiburg Baroque Orchestra under Pablo Heras-Casado. The recording THRACE – Sunday Morning Sessions explores, in collaboration with the Chemirani brothers and Sokratis Sinopoulos, the intersections of contemporary music, improvisation and Mediterranean traditions. In addition to the first CD of the Invisible Stream Ensemble 2022, consisting of Jean-Guihen Queyras, Raphaël Imbert, Pierre-François Blanchard and Sonny Troupé, the recording of the cello concertos by Kraft and CPE Bach with the Ensemble Resonanz under the direction of Riccardo Minasi was released in 2024. He has also released a new recording of the complete cello suites by Johann Sebastian Bach, 17 years after the first complete recording in 2007. Jean-Guihen Queyras records exclusively for harmonia mundi.

In the 2025/26 season, Queyras will perform under the baton of Yannick Nézet-Seguin, Dima Slobodeniouk, Andris Poga, Juraj Valcuha, Duncan Ward, Karina Canellakis, Aziz Shokhakimov, Christian Reif with renowned orchestras such as the Boston Symphony Orchestra, the BBC Philharmonic, Konzerthausorchester Berlin, Symphonieorchester des Bayerischen Rundfunks, Radio Filharmonisch Orkest, Orchestre Philharmonique de Strasbourg, Orchestre Métropolitain, the Kammerakademie Potsdam and the Tampere Philharmonic Orchestra. Highlights of the season include a tour with the Chamber Orchestra of Europe, Yannick Nézet-Seguin and Veronika Eberle, with concerts in Prague, Luxembourg, Paris, New York and Philadelphia, as well as tours to Japan, Korea, and Taiwan. Together with Alexandre Tharaud he will premiere a new double concerto by Oscar Strasnoy.

Jean-Guihen Queyras holds a professorship at the University of Music Freiburg and is Artistic Director of the “Rencontres Musicales de Haute-Provence” festival in Forcalquier. He plays on the ‘Kaiser’ Stradivarius made in Cremona in 1707, kindly made available to him by Canimex Inc. of Drummondville (Quebec), Canada.