©Photo: Joel Larson

©Photo: Lisa-Marie Mazzucco

Osmo Vänskä

Conductor

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“Vänskä isn’t only about meticulous preparation. In concert he’s a wiry dynamo: lean, whippy and indefatigably energetic. His interpretations are the same. He never stops probing and pushing.”
(The Times)

Music Director: Minnesota Orchestra
Music Director: Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra
Honorary Conductor: Iceland Symphony Orchestra
Conductor Laureate: Lahti Symphony Orchestra

Music Director of Minnesota Orchestra for 18 years and of Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra since 2020, Osmo Vänskä is recognised for compelling interpretations of repertoire of all ages and an energetic presence on the podium. His democratic and inclusive style of work has been key in forging long-standing relationships with different orchestras.

Celebrating the last year of his tenure with Minnesota Orchestra this season, Osmo Vänskä presents some of his signature repertoire. He is joined by favourite guest soloists including Joshua Bell and Lisa Batiashvili, and continues with This Is Minnesota Orchestra, an Emmy Award-nominated series of performances for TV, radio and online audiences launched in 2020, developed in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Vänskä has undertaken five major European tours, as well as historic trips to Cuba in 2015 – the first visit by an American orchestra since the two countries re-established diplomatic relations – and South Africa in 2018, as part of worldwide celebrations of Nelson Mandela’s Centenary – the first visit by an American orchestra, drawing together South African and American performers in musical expressions of peace, freedom and reconciliation, on a five-city tour following a successful return to London’s BBC Proms.

After a successful first season with Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra, including opening and closing the Lotte Concert Hall Festival and recording works by Korean composer Isang Yun, he embarks on his second year with numerous concerts and community outreach projects.

He returns this season to the Symphony and Philharmonic orchestras of Pittsburgh, Antwerp, Helsinki, Netherlands Radio and Tokyo Metropolitan. While past guest conducting invitations include renowned international ensembles such as The Cleveland Orchestra, Philadelphia, San Francisco and Chicago symphony orchestras in North America; Orchestre de Paris, Berlin’s Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester and Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester in Europe, and London Philharmonic Orchestra in the UK; and the Shanghai Symphony and China, Hangzhou, Hong Kong and Taiwan philharmonic orchestras in Asia.

Osmo Vänska - Sibelius Symphony No. 2 © Minnesota Orchestra

Vänskä’s commitment to educational work is also patent through his work with Curtis Institute of Music Symphony Orchestra, leading a series of conducting seminars, and recently on tours to Europe and United States, and New World Symphony in Miami, where he also coaches its Conducting Fellows.

A distinguished recording artist for BIS label, Vänskä is currently recording all of Mahler’s symphonies with Minnesota Orchestra. With seven discs released to date, the Fifth Symphony received a Grammy nomination in 2017 for Best Orchestral Performance. They also recorded the complete symphonies of Beethoven and Sibelius to critical acclaim, winning a Grammy Award for Best Orchestral Performance in 2014 and receiving further nominations in different years.

Vänskä studied conducting at Finland’s Sibelius Academy and was awarded first prize in the 1982 Besançon Competition. He began his career as a clarinetist, occupying the co-principal chair of the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra. He regularly performs in chamber music, having been invited to La Jolla Summerfest, Seattle Chamber Music Festival, Naantali Summer Festival, Sysmä Summer Sounds, Music in Ruovesi, etc. He has recorded Bernhard Henrik Crusell’s three Clarinet Quartets and Kalevi Aho’s Clarinet Quintet for the BIS label and is in the process of recording several duos for clarinet and violin which he has commissioned with his wife, violinist Erin Keefe.

Vänskä is the recipient of a Royal Philharmonic Society Award, the Finlandia Foundation’s Arts and Letters award, and the 2010 Ditson Award from Columbia University. He holds honorary doctorates from the universities of Glasgow and Minnesota and was named Musical America’s 2005 Conductor of the Year. In 2013 he received the Annual Award from the German Record Critics’ Award Association for his involvement in BIS’s recordings of the complete works by Sibelius.

HarrisonParrott represents Osmo Vänskä for worldwide general management.

Gustav Mahler: Symphony no. 10 (excerpt) © Iceland Symphony Orchestra

Osmo Vänska - Harmonia Ubuntu [World Premiere] © Minnesota Orchestra

Osmo Vänska - Mahler Symphony No. 2 - Resurrection © Minnesota Orchestra

Osmo Vänska - Mahler's Fourth Symphony © Minnesota Orchestra

Osmo Vänska - Mahler's Fifth Symphony © Minnesota Orchestra

Osmo Vänska - Recording Mahler's Sixth Symphony © Minnesota Orchestra

Osmo Vänska - Tchaikovsky Symphony No.5 © Minnesota Orchestra

Osmo Vänska - My North—Episode 12: Osmo Vänskä © Mpls.St.Paul Magazine

Osmo Vänskä discusses Sibelius © London Philharmonic Orchestra

Osmo Vänskä discusses Sibelius’ Symphonies © London Philharmonic Orchestra

Osmo Vänskä & The Minnesota Orchestra tour to Cuba © Minnesota Orchestra 2015

Osmo Vänska - interview © MN Original

“Vänskä’s interpretation had marvellous energy and dramatic fire.”

(The Guardian, February 2020)

“The synergetic success of the Minnesota Orchestra and conductor Osmo Vänskä makes their ongoing Mahler cycle a landmark event (…) From the opening bars of the first movement it is clear that Vänskä and the Minnesota players are on a mission. (…)The Minnesota Orchestra’s playing here is gorgeous and refined throughout.”

(ConcertoNet, January 2019)

“[On Mahler’s Symphony No.7] Osmo Vänskä has always been an energetic, dynamic conductor. Did we always know that he is also a supreme sifter and balancer of orchestral textures, a creator of tingling sonic subtleties? If not, we know it now.”

(Star Tribune, November 2018)

“But rare rewards awaited after intermission, for the Mahler Fourth was given the most exquisite interpretation of the several I’ve heard in concert. Vanska coaxed a paradoxical combination of force and gentleness from the opening movement, encouraging a light and frolicsome tone before seemingly crafting a dark, bitter concoction from the same ingredients. With delicious dynamic contrast — I’ve never heard the pianissimos so soft in this symphony — it was a performance both technically precise and full of emotion. I can’t recall the last time I was as deeply moved at a Minnesota Orchestra concert as I was by the third movement of the Mahler Fourth. What began in blissful beauty soon found the composer staring unblinking into sorrowful darkness, a place that Vanska and the orchestra made intensely troubling before emerging into a blast of bright major-key sunshine.”

(St. Paul Pioneer Press, June 2018)

“Vänskä took [Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 1]’s entire expressive range in stride, leading a performance that was by turns drily entertaining (the first movement especially) and stirringly tender. The symphony’s formal restlessness, in particular, seemed to cause him no trouble at all.”

(The San Francisco Chronicle, October 2017)

“This was Osmo Vanska at his finest, seizing the reins of his orchestra with a complex and confident interpretation, and shaping the sound with high-energy body language and a level of attention to detail hard to achieve with such an expansive ensemble. And he was as engaging to watch as I’ve ever seen him, a virtual dervish on the podium.”

(St. Paul Pioneer Press, June 2017)

“Vänskä opened the work with concentrated majesty, an impressive depth of string sound informing the contribution of the Curtis Symphony Orchestra.”

(Classical Source, May 2017)

“This was a performance of great intensity — not just because of some impetuous tempo changes and smart emotional pacing, but also through the lustrous ensemble sound the conductor had obviously cultivated. (…) The conductor had the trust of the orchestra, and charisma bloomed.”

(Philly.com, May 2017)

“The performance of the Sibelius was nothing less than hair-raising. Vänskä may have been conducting this music all his life, but he has lost nothing of the will to explore further, and still with an urgency and spontaneity that send shivers down one’s back. (…) Everything was gripping, from the big picture to the smallest detail. Only Vänskä could deliver a Sibelius symphony cycle that promises to be as exciting as this.”

(Financial Times, October 2016)

“Leaping about as if treading hot coals, Vänskä sculpted one of the sharpest, most belligerent readings of Sibelius’s Symphony No 1 that these ears have heard” *****

(The Times, October 2016)

“A complete cycle of the Sibelius symphonies, such as was embarked on by the LPO last night, is an attractive enough proposition in its own right. To have it conducted by Osmo Vanska, the composer’s compatriot and one of his finest interpreters today, makes it very special indeed. (…) The First Symphony in E minor may not be a masterpiece on the level of the later ones, but Vanska, with his taut rhythms and furious tempi, makes it a thrilling helter-skelter ride.”

(Evening Standard, October 2016)

“From the plunging energy of the opening of the Third Symphony to the bleak, raw ending of the Seventh, this is a gripping listen” *****

(The Guardian, July 2016)

“With these recordings, Vanska confirms his status as our greatest living Sibelian. Irreplaceable”

(Sunday Times, Hugh Canning, July 2016)

“This is one the world has been waiting for. The Minnesota Orchestra’s partnership with the Finnish conductor Osmo Vänskä is a treasure of our times, especially when they play music of the frozen north. Minnesota is sufficiently remote from the rest of musical America to maintain its own sound and Vänskä, ever the iconoclast, has his own particular way of refreshing familiar scores. The start of their Sibelius cycle hit the decks with a whoosh five years ago.”

(Norman Lebrecht, July 2016)

“The LSO were on virtuoso form throughout, Vänskä unleashing a searing intensity in the opening movement while punching out the racy rhythms and raucous comedy of the finale with unstoppable momentum” *****

(The Guardian, George Hall, April 2015)