Karina Canellakis

Karina Canellakis is the Chief Conductor of the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra (Radio Filharmonisch Orkest, RFO) since 2019, and the Principal Guest Conductor of the London Philharmonic Orchestra since 2021. Universally acclaimed for her symphonic and operatic performances characterized by their emotional impact, interpretive depth, and technical command, Karina Canellakis is welcomed by the finest musical institutions across the globe. As Chief Conductor of the RFO, she programs and leads a diverse and eclectic season of new and commissioned works by living composers alongside the great masterworks in Amsterdam’s Concertgebouw as well as in TivoliVredenburg in Utrecht. Symphonic highlights of 2024/25 include Mahler’s Third Symphony, Brahms’ ‘Ein Deutsches Requiem’, and Elgar’s ‘The Dream of Gerontius’. With the London Philharmonic, she has programmed a broad repertoire from Mozart to Saariaho, and continues to tour once a year with the orchestra.

Guest engagements this season include debuts with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra as well as Staatskapelle Dresden (in their televised New Year’s Eve concert), along with return visits to the Munich Philharmonic, Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, Orchestre de Paris, New York Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony and Washington DC’s National Symphony Orchestra. Karina Canellakis returns to the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées in Paris to conduct Poulenc’s ‘Dialogues des Carmélites’ with Les Siècles in the pit. She conducts at least one opera-in-concert each season with the RFO in the Concertgebouw, and in 2024/25 will lead Janáček’s ‘From the House of the Dead’, completing a cycle of Janáček operas over the past three seasons, including ‘Kát’a Kabanová’, ‘The Cunning Little Vixen’, and ‘The Makropulos Affair’. Last season she also led Wagner’s complete ‘Siegfried’, having previously conducted acts from Wagner’s ‘Tristan und Isolde’ and ‘Die Walküre’. She made her Santa Fe Opera debut last summer with an acclaimed production and performance of Richard Strauss’ ‘Der Rosenkavalier’, and in previous seasons has conducted a wide range of the opera canon including Tchaikovsky’s ‘Eugene Onegin’, Mozart’s ‘Don Giovanni’, ‘Die Zauberflöte’ and ‘Le nozze di Figaro’.

April 2023 saw the start of a multi-album collaboration between Karina Canellakis, the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra and Pentatone with their debut release, Bartok’s Concerto for Orchestra and ‘Four Orchestral Pieces’, earning a GRAMMY nomination. Her second album for Pentatone, Bartok’s ‘Bluebeard’s Castle’, is due for release in February 2025. Karina Canellakis and the RFO were also featured artists for the launch of Apple Music Classical with a recording of Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 1 with Alice Sara Ott. 

Since winning the Sir Georg Solti Conducting Award in 2016, Karina Canellakis has developed close relationships with several of the world’s leading orchestras. She regularly returns to European orchestras such as the Bavarian Radio Symphony, Orchestre de Paris, Vienna Symphony, and Munich Philharmonic, and is a repeat guest with the top American orchestras such as the Boston, Chicago, San Francisco symphonies, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and the Cleveland and Philadelphia Orchestras. She was Principal Guest Conductor of the Rundfunk-Sinfonieorchester Berlin from 2019 – 2023, and in 2023/24 was a featured Artist-in-Residence at Vienna’s Musikverein. She has toured Australia and will make her debut in Japan in July 2025. Already known to many in the classical music world as a virtuoso violinist, Karina Canellakis was encouraged to pursue conducting by Sir Simon Rattle while playing in the Berlin Philharmonic’s Orchestre-Akademie. She performed for several years as soloist, guest leader, and chamber musician, spending many summers at the Marlboro Music Festival, until conducting eventually became her focus.