Artistic leadership

Tapiola Sinfonietta is independently responsible for its artistic programming. The orchestra does not have a chief conductor; instead of a traditional conductor, programming is handled by an artistic leadership team consisting of the artistic director and two musician members elected by the orchestra. Programs featuring artistic partners and artists-in-residence are planned in collaboration with them.

The 2026–2027 season was planned by principal flutist Hanna Juutilainen, first concertmaster Janne Nisonen, and intendant Maati Rehor. A new artistic leadership team took office at the beginning of 2026, consisting of Artistic Director Rehor, Ilkka Hongisto, associate principal horn, and Concertmaster Jukka Rantamäki. Their term will last until the end of 2028.

Principal artistic responsibility in the Tapiola Sinfonietta rests not with a chief conductor but with the Artistic Board, which is in charge of repertoire planning and artistic improvement. The Artistic Board also selects the guest conductors and soloists. This administrative model is used by a handful of chamber orchestras around the world but remains a rarity. The Tapiola Sinfonietta adopted this model in 2001. The Board picks out concert programs, guest conductors and guest soloists and puts them into a proposal submitted to the Repertoire Committee.

One of Europe’s most highly regarded French-German cellists, conductors, and artistic directors, Altstaedt’s range of activities is exceptionally broad. He performs both early and contemporary music, on both period and modern instruments. As an interpreter of contemporary music, he has collaborated with composers such as Thomas Adès, Jörg Widmann, and Sofia Gubaidulina. He has directed the Lockenhaus Chamber Music Festival since 2012 and served for many years as artistic director of the Haydn Philharmonie. Altstaedt regularly performs as a soloist and conductor with leading orchestras, including the Vienna Philharmonic, the London Philharmonic, and the NHK Symphony Orchestra.

As a chamber musician, he has collaborated with artists such as Janine Jansen, Vilde Frang, Pekka Kuusisto, and Fazıl Say, and Altstaedt regularly performs at major international festivals, including those in Salzburg, Verbier, and the BBC Proms.

Altstaedt’s recordings have received widespread international acclaim, and he has been honored with awards including the BBC Music Magazine Awards, the Credit Suisse Award, and the Beethovenring Bonn.

For the Tapiola Sinfonietta, Nicolas’s wholehearted dedication to music is a great source of inspiration.

Read more about Nicolas(external link, opens in a new window).

Conductor Ryan Bancroft has been Artist-in-Association with the Tapiola Sinfonietta since autumn 2021.

Bancroft has been on a steadily rising career trajectory in recent years. He attained international recognition when he won 1st prize and the audience prize at the Malko Competition for young conductors in 2018.

In autumn 2020, he took up the post of Principal Conductor of the BBC National Orchestra of Wales. In November 2021, he was awarded Conductor of the Year by the Royal Philharmonic Society, and in December 2021 he was appointed Chief Conductor of the Stockholm Royal Philharmonic as of the 2023–2024 season.

“It’s an honour to be appointed [Artist in Association] of Tapiola Sinfonietta. During these increasingly difficult times, we look firmly to the arts for joy and consolation; it is heartening that we also look enthusiastically towards the future. In collaborating with this orchestra, I’ve discovered a rare and deeply moving approach to music making: the eagerness to reimagine the concert experience, the dedication to chamber ideals, and the remarkable ‘We are in this together’ outlook. For these reasons, I’m sincerely grateful to the extraordinary artists, staff, and audience for their warm welcome.”

Ryan Bancroft first performed with the Tapiola Sinfonietta in 2019, and a warm connection was immediately established between him, the musicians and the administration. He has also been a guest conductor during the 2020/2021 season. The orchestra is enthusiastic about working with Bancroft, whose broad range as a musician in terms of styles and interpretations, besides playing multiple instruments himself, has impressed audiences and critics alike.

Marzi Nyman is a Finnish guitarist, composer and singer. He does not, perhaps, represent the conventional image of an Artist in Association to a classical chamber orchestra. But his mastery as a guitarist, singer, composer and arranger, and his light-music networks have been put to good use in producing concerts, especially those for the young.

Nyman’s role as Artist in Association with the Tapiola Sinfonietta includes appearing as soloist in his own Concerto for electric guitar and in a concert of music by Frank Zappa. In October 2020 Tapiola Sinfonietta premiered Nyman's new work for the orchestra titled “Lost Key”, a music performance for children.

“I feel deeply passionate about chamber and orchestral music,” he says. “When the Sinfonietta players invited me to be their partner, I had to pinch myself. My feelings had been reciprocated! The partnership is absolutely one of the biggest honours I have received. The contact with the players is extremely important to me, and I dream of even closer dialogue with them. I also hope that we may, at our concerts, hear a real “band” of which I am privileged to be a member. My feeling is this: ‘The playground is open: Come on in!"

French conductor and violinist Jean-Jacques Kantorow was given the title of Honorary Conductor of the Tapiola Sinfonietta in 2011. He was the orchestra’s Artistic Director from 1993 to 1999 and its regular conductor from 2000 to 2006.

His tenure was of crucial importance to the shaping of the sound of the Tapiola Sinfonietta. He also conducted the orchestra in a substantial number of recordings: of the 60 items in the discography, about one third were conducted by Kantorow.

About one third of the more than 70 albums in the discography of the Tapiola Sinfonietta were recorded under Jean-Jacques Kantorow. The most recent of these, a recording of Piano Concertos nos. 3 to 5 by Saint-Saëns with Alexandre Kantorow as soloist, has received several international prizes and accolades.

Apart from his conducting career, Kantorow is also a successful concert violinist and has won prizes in several international competitions.

The Tapiola Sinfonietta engages in close collaboration with its Artists in Association and with an annually appointed Artist in Residence.

The orchestra has been appointing Artists in Association since 2006.

Chief conductors and artistic partners of Tapiola Sinfonietta are listed below.

1987-1988 Jorma Panula

1987-1990 Juhani Lamminmäki

1990-1992 Osmo Vänskä

1993-2006 Jean-Jacques Kantorow

1999-2001 Tuomas Ollila

2001-2002 John Storgårds

2003-2009 Olli Mustonen

2006-2013 Pekka Kuusisto

2006-2012 Stefan Asbury

2010-2019 Mario Venzago

2011-2014 Santtu-Matias Rouvali

2013- Marzi Nyman

2014-2019 Alexander Melnikov

2018-2021 Klaus Mäkelä

2021- Ryan Bancroft

2019/2020 Taavi Oramo, conductor

2020/2021  Tuuli Takala, soprano

2021/2022 Sebastian Fagerlund, composer

2022/2023 Katharine Dain, soprano

2023/2024 Juha Itkonen, author

Because the Tapiola Sinfonietta is relatively small, with 44 members, and because many of its members have known each other for a long time, the ensemble often performs without a conductor.

Performed with the leader taking leadership responsibility within the ranks, as it were, such concerts highlight the personal skills of each musician and the essential chamber music nature of musical performance. Not all works can be performed without a conductor, however, so each such program is carefully considered with regard to rhythm, texture and orchestration.

The Tapiola Sinfonietta has developed conductor-less performing into an important format alongside other types of performance.