New music director of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra Klaus Mäkelä at the Mandarin Oriental New York on March 20 in New York.
Klaus Mäkelä conducts members of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra in a performance of López Bellido’s “Aino” at the Symphony Center on Feb. 16, 2022, in Chicago. Mäkelä, 28, is the fastest-rising conductor of his generation. At 24, he became the chief conductor of the Oslo Philharmonic, and the music director of Orchestre de Paris at 25. He will be the youngest music director in the CSO’s history when he assumes the post in 2027. His five-year contract has him leading the orchestra at least through 2032.
But for one conductor to helm two ultra-prestigious orchestras, like the CSO and Concertgebouw, is highly unusual in the classical music world. To devote his attention to those posts, Mäkelä told the Tribune his guest conducting days are essentially over. He’ll make exceptions only for the Berlin and Vienna Philharmonics — also considered the world’s finest — and his former colleagues in Paris and Oslo, because “they always will be my family.
Because of Mäkelä’s exclusive recording contract with Decca Classics, the orchestra will begin releasing albums under that label for the first time since Sir Georg Solti led the orchestra more than three decades ago. The first of those, Alexander says, may arrive “within a year or two,” before the official start of Mäkelä’s contract in 2027.
Mäkelä made his professional debut at age 7, as part of the children’s chorus in a Finnish National Opera production of “Carmen.” But for young Klaus, the magic wasn’t onstage: it coursed from the pit, conjured by the conductor. He was just 12 when he started studying with Jorma Panula, a formidable pedagogue at Helsinki’s Sibelius Academy.
“I was impressed that sounded like the Chicago Symphony of the past. That was very beautiful, because in today’s world, orchestras start sounding the same,” Mäkelä said. “They sounded special.” “Klaus had a knack for giving very clear, understandable instructions to fit into the bigger picture he was looking for, which was remarkable coming from a young conductor,” Buchman says.