Kent Nagano is considered one of today’s outstanding conductors for both operatic and orchestral repertoire. He will be the next Chief Conductor and Artistic Director of the Orquesta y Coro Nacionales de España in Madrid starting in September 2026 and is the newly appointed Principal Artistic Partner of Filarmonica Toscanini. From 2015 to 2025, he was the General Music Director of the Hamburg State Opera and Chief Conductor of the Hamburg Philharmonic State Orchestra, from 2006 to 2020, he was Music Director of the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal and was appointed Conductor Emeritus in February 2021. In 2006 he was appointed Honorary Conductor of the DSO Berlin, after serving as its Music Director from 2000, and in 2019 of Concerto Köln.
Highlights in Hamburg were the premiere of Berlioz’ ‘Les Troyens’, the world premiere of Toshio Hosokawa’s ‘Stilles Meer’, Messiaen’s ‘Turangalîla’ with the Hamburg Ballet and John Neumeier, the ‘Philharmonische Akademie’ – a project in the tradition of musical academies of the 18th/19th century –, the South America Tour with the Philharmoniker Hamburg, the world premiere of Jörg Widmann’s oratorio ‘ARCHE’, composed on the occasion of the inauguration of the Elbphilharmonie in January 2017, and the premieres of Alban Berg’s ‘Lulu’ and Strauss’ ‘Frau ohne Schatten’.
A milestone in Kent Nagano’s collaboration with the Orchestre symphonique de Montréal was the inauguration of the orchestra’s new concert hall La Maison Symphonique in September 2011. In October 2016, he conducted the world premiere of José Evangelista’s ‘Accelerando’, commissioned by the orchestra on the occasion of the 50th anniversary of Montréal’s metro. In November of the same year he conducted a semi-staged production of the ‘St Matthew Passion’. Further highlights with the orchestra include the complete cycles of Beethoven and Mahler symphonies, Schoenberg’s ‘Gurrelieder’, concert versions of Wagner’s ‘Tannhäuser’, ‘Tristan und Isolde’, ‘Das Rheingold’, Honegger’s ‘Jeanne d’Arc au Bûcher’ and Messiaen’s ‘Saint François d’Assise’.
As a much sought-after guest conductor, Kent Nagano has worked with the world’s leading international orchestras, including the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Munich Philharmonic, the London Symphony Orchestra, the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich, the NHK Symphony Orchestra and the Chicago Symphony Orchestra and the Ensemble Modern.
Nagano has worked with labels such as Decca, Sony Classical, FARAO Classics and Analekta for many years, but has also recorded with BIS, Berlin Classics, Erato, Teldec, Pentatone, Deutsche Grammophon and Harmonia Mundi. He was awarded Grammys for his recordings of Busoni’s ‘Doktor Faust’ with Opéra National de Lyon, Prokofjew’s ‘Peter and the Wolf’ with the Russian National Orchestra and Saariaho’s ‘L’amour de Loin’ with the DSO Berlin.
At the Bayerische Staatsoper, where he was General Music Director from 2006 to 2013, Kent Nagano commissioned new operas such as ‘Babylon’ by Jörg Widmann, ‘Das Gehege’ by Wolfgang Rihm and ‘Alice in Wonderland’ by Unsuk Chin.
A very important period in Nagano’s career was his time as Music Directr of the DSO Berlin, from 2000 to 2006. He performed Schönberg’s ‘Moses und Aron’ with the orchestra and took them to the Salzburg Festival as well as to the Festspielhaus Baden-Baden. Recordings with the DSO Berlin for harmonia mundi include repertoire as diverse as Bernstein’s Mass, Bruckner’s Symphonies Nos. 3 and 6, Beethoven’s ‘Christus am Ölberge’, Wolf’s Lieder, Mahler’s Symphony No.8 and Schönberg’s ‘Die Jakobsleiter’ and ‘Friede auf Erden’, as well as Brahms’ Symphony No.4 and Schönberg’s Variationen für Orchester, Op.31.
Kent Nagano was awarded Honorary Doctorates from McGill University in Montréal in 2005, the Université de Montréal in 2006, and Francisco State University in 2018. Since 2017, Kent Nagano has been a Compagnon of the Ordre des arts et des lettres of Québec and in the fall of 2023, Kent Nagano was also awarded the title of Chevalier in the Ordre des art et des lettres of France. In February 2024, Nagano was awarded the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany by the Federal President and in June 2024 he was awarded the Order of Canada, Canada’s highest civilian honor. Kent Nagano is the recipient of the 2024 Brahms Prize of the Brahms Society of Schleswig-Holstein.
