The Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra is known worldwide as one of Europe’s most versatile orchestras with an exciting and varied repertoire and a constant striving to break new ground The multi-award-winning orchestra has been praised for its exceptional, wide-ranging musicianship as well as collaborations with the world’s foremost composers, conductors and soloists.

Permanent home of the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra since 1979 is Berwaldhallen, the Swedish Radio’s concert hall. In addition to the audience in the hall, the orchestra reaches many many listeners on the radio and the web and through it´s partnership with EBU. Several concerts are also broadcast and streamed on Berwaldhallen Play and with Swedish Television, offering the audience more opportunities to come as close as possible to one of the world’s top orchestras.

“The orchestra has a unique combination of humility, sensibility and musical imagination”, says Daniel Harding, Music Director of the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra since 2007. “I have never had a concert with the orchestra where they haven’t played as though their lives depended on it!”

The first radio orchestra was founded in 1925, the same year that the Swedish Radio Service began its broadcasts. The Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra received its current name in 1967. Through the years, the orchestra has had several distinguished Music Directors. Two of them, Herbert Blomstedt and Esa-Pekka Salonen, have since been appointed Conductors Laureate.

For more than 90 years, the Swedish Radio Choir has contributed to the development of the Swedish a cappella tradition. Under the leadership of legendary conductor Eric Ericson, the choir earned great international renown. It is still hailed as one of the best choirs in the world. The choir members’ ability to switch between powerful solo performances and seamlessly integrating themselves in the ensemble creates a unique and dynamic instrument praised by critics and music lovers alike, as well as by the many guest conductors who explore and challenge the choir’s possibilities.

Permanent home of the Swedish Radio Choir since 1979 is Berwaldhallen, the Swedish Radio’s concert hall. In addition to the seated audience, the choir reaches millions of listeners on the radio and the web through Klassiska konserten i P2. Several concerts are also broadcast and streamed on Berwaldhallen Play, offering the audience more opportunities to come as close as possible to one of the world’s top choirs.

With the 2020–2021 season, Kaspars Putniņš begins his tenure as the tenth Music Director of the Swedish Radio Choir. Since January 2019, Marc Korovitch is the choirmaster of the Swedish Radio Choir with responsibility for the ensemble’s continued artistic development. Two of the orchestra’s former Music Directors, Tõnu Kaljuste and Peter Dijkstra, were appointed Conductors Laureate in November 2019. Both maintain a close relationship with the choir and make regular guest appearances.

The Swedish Radio Choir was founded the same year as the Swedish Radio Service began its broadcasts and the choir had its first concert in May 1925. Right from the start, the choir had high ambitions with a conscious aim to perform contemporary music.

The Eric Ericson Chamber Choir was founded in 1945 by the then 27-year-old Eric Ericson and has since been a prominent hub of the Swedish as well as the international music scene. The ensemble’s interest in continually finding new music and new fields of work has given them a very extensive repertoire: from early music to the very latest. For generations of Swedish and international composers, the choir has represented an ideal with its characteristic Nordic sound and skilful virtuosity. The Eric Ericson Chamber Choir is part of the international elite of professional ensembles. Fredrik Malmberg has been their choirmaster since 2013.

Esa-Pekka Salonen’s restless innovation drives him constantly to reposition classical music in the 21st century. Since 2020, he is the Music Director of the San Francisco Symphony. From 2008 to 2021 he was the Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor for London’s Philharmonia Orchestra, where he is now Conductor Laureate. In London he launched the award-winning RE-RITE and Universe of Sound installations which have allowed people all over the world to step inside the orchestra through audio and video projections. Salonen also drove the development of a much-hailed tablet app, The Orchestra, which gives the user unprecedented access to the internal workings of eight symphonic works.

Salonen is Conductor Laureate for both the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra and the Los Angeles Philharmonic. He was Music Director of the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra from 1985 until 1995 and he was the Music Director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic from 1992 until 2009. Salonen co-founded the annual Baltic Sea in 2003. Salonen is also a composer and from 2015 to 2018 he was Composer in Residence at the New York Philharmonic. In 2020, he was appointed an honorary Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire (KBE) by the Queen of England. For the 2022/23 season, Esa-Pekka Salonen is the Berliner Philharmoniker’s Composer in Residence.

Soprano Hannah Holgersson is renowned for her unusual range, which encompasses early renaissance and baroque music, opera and avant-garde, as well as both pop and rock music. In her commitment to contemporary art music, she has worked closely with composers such as Anders Hillborg, Ingvar Lidholm, Steve Dobrogosz and Kjell Perder and she has performed with prominent orchestras such as the Scottish Chamber Orchestra, the Norrköping Symphony Orchestra, the San Francisco Symphony, the Drottningholm Baroque Ensemble and the percussion ensemble, Kroumata. Holgersson is a trained solo singer and teacher at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm.

Finska sellisten Jan-Erik Gustafsson började spela cello som 8 årig i västra Helsingfors Musikinstitut under ledning av Markku Luolajan-Mikkola och slutförde solistdiplomen i Stockholm 1992 under ledning av Frans Helmerson. Gustafssons solokarriär började med EBU: s solist tävling i Köpenhamn 1986. Sedan dess har Gustafsson spelat som solist med nästan alla finska orkestrar, London LSO, Birmingham, Bournemouth, Amsterdam, Halle, Tallnn, Stockholm RSO, Malmö, Götheborg, Köpenhamn, Stavanger, Oslo, Washington, Tulsa, Hobart, Brisbane, Galicia och Las Palmas Symfoniorkestrar, samt med Tokyo, Hong Kong, Stockholm och Pecs Philharmoniker. Dessutom har han spelat som solist med Kammarorkestern i New York, Australien, Amsterdam, Wien och Lausanne, samt Camerata Bern och Amadeus kammarorkestern.

Höjdpunkterna under den senaste säsongen inkluderade bland annatkonserter med MDR-Leipzig och Prague symfoniorkestrar. Gustafsson är en mycket aktiv kammarmusiker och är närvarande på festivaler över hela världen. Gustafsson har varit konstnärlig ledare för Lovisa Sibelius-dagar sedan 1998. Jan-Eriks instrument är en Stefano Scarampella Sello (1890). Han har spelat in flera CDn för skivbolagen Ondine, LPO och BIS.