Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla

In 2016, Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla was appointed Music Director of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, succeeding conductors such as Sir Simon Rattle and Andris Nelsons. The CBSO has since given numerous performances under her direction, including guest appearances and tours worldwide. She stepped down as music director at the end of the 2021/22 season but remains Associate Artist of the orchestra. 
Recent highlights include a highly acclaimed new production of Mieczysław Weinberg’s ‘The Passenger’ at Teatro Real Madrid, debuts with New York Philharmonic and Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden as well as guest appearances with Münchner Philharmoniker, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France and Philadelphia Orchestra. 

The 2024 edition of the Salzburg Festival sees Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla making her first operatic appearance there with a new production of Weinberg’s ‘The Idiot’, directed by Krzysztof Warlikowski. Other projects in 2024/25 encompass returns to Sinfonieorchester Basel, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, Münchner Philharmoniker and Bayerische Staatsoper, as well as debuts with Gewandhausorchester Leipzig and Wiener Philharmoniker. 

A native of Vilnius, Lithuania, Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla was born into a musical family. She graduated with a bachelor’s degree in choral and orchestral conducting from the University of Music and Fine Arts, Graz, Austria. Afterwards she continued to study at the Music Conservatory in Bologna, the Music Conservatory in Leipzig and the Music Conservatory in Zurich. From 2011 – 2014 she worked as Kapellmeister at the Theater and Orchester Heidelberg and at the Konzert Theater Bern, before being appointed Music Director of the Salzburger Landestheater (2015 – 17). 

Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla’s debut CD was released by Deutsche Grammophon in spring 2019. It was hailed as a significant contribution to the rediscovery of Mieczysław Weinberg’s œuvre and won both the Opus Klassik and Grammophon Awards in 2020. The recordings were made with the participation of City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Kremerata Baltica and Gidon Kremer. This was followed by further releases for DG: a portrait album of the Lithuanian composer Raminta Šerkšnytė, ‘The British Project’ with works by Benjamin Britten, Edward Elgar, William Walton and Ralph Vaughan Williams and the continuation of the Weinberg recording-project.