Klaus Mäkelä
(c) Heikki Tuuli
The Philharmonie de Paris has announced Finnish conductor Klaus Mäkelä (*1996) as the next Music Director of the Orchestre de Paris, as successor to Daniel Harding.
Klaus Mäkelä will initially assume the position of Music Advisor to the Orchestre de Paris from 1 September 2020 to 31 August 2022 and be appointed Music Director from 1 September 2022 for a period of five years.
As a part of his commitment as Music Director, Klaus Mäkelä will conduct approximately 12 weeks of concerts with the Orchestre de Paris each year, both at home in the Philharmonie and on tour,
Klaus Mäkelä will return to France already on Thursday, 9 July 2020 to perform with the Orchestre de Paris in a programme combining Ravel’s Le Tombeau de Couperin and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7. This will be the first concert presented by the Philharmonie de Paris since the outbreak of the Coronavirus epidemic.
The Finnish conductor and cellist Klaus Mäkelä was born in Helsinki in 1996 into a family of musicians. He started studying music at the Sibelius Academy in Helsinki at the age of 12 with Jorma Panula (conducting) and Marko Ylönen (cello).
Klaus Mäkelä made his first appearance with the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra in 2017, becoming Principal Guest Conductor at the start of the following season. Since 2018, he has also been Artist in Association of the Tapiola Sinfonietta and since 2019 Artistic Director of the Turku Music Festival.
In 2018, he was appointed Chief Conductor and Artistic Advisor of the Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra, where he commences his tenure in the 2020-2021 season for a period of 7 years.
