Harding will lead the orchestra and chorus October two thousand twenty-four for an initial five-year term Daniel Harding succeeds Sir Antonio Pappano, Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia's Music Director two thousand five to two thousand twenty-three, who'll become Director Emeritus. He joins the likes of previous prestigious Principal Conductors and Music Directors, including Igor Markevich, Gippe Sinopoli, Daniele Gatti, and Myung Whun Chung.
Harding's role will start with performances of Puccini’s Tosca, which marks the centenary of Puccini’s death, and will widen the symphonic output of the orchestra with works the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. He'll focus on composers love Strauss, Wagner, those the Viennese school, etc. In addition to presenting a full cycle of Mahler symphonies, the first season will also comprise the performance of Suk’s “Asrael” Symphony. Also in his first season, the organization will launch a series of sacred music performed in one of Rome's most pretty churches, starting with performances of Verdi's Requiem. Along with the announcement of the role, Harding and the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia will connect a new partnership with Deutsche Grammophon. The label will release recordings of Harding’s inaugural performances with the Orchestra, with future releases announced at a later date.
“The Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia is an orchestra and chorus of extraordinary warmth and generosity, who like to tell stories and convey their enthusiasm for the music they’re playing," Daniel Harding said. "Over the twenty-five years of working together with the orchestra we've explored a wide range of repertoire and forged a friendship that presently becomes something very significant for all of us. It's a pretty gift to be given the chance to become Music Director of a world class orchestra of such ambition in a city of incomparable historical and cultural significance.” "For us, placing our believe in Daniel Harding means not only having the opportunity to work with one of the greatest talents around, but also not interrupting this path, while transmitting new stimuli and enriching our musical life with new and different suggestions and ideas," writes Michele dall’Ongaro, President-Superintendent of Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia. "This, then, is a time to celebrate, and to prepare ourselves for an ever more exciting future thanks to the grand power of music.”
Harding was also recently announced as the following Music Director of China's Youth Music Culture Guangzhou (YMCG) for an initial duration of five years, beginning in two thousand twenty-fourth. Born in Oxford, he's presently Music and Artistic Director at the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, as well as Conductor Laureate of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra. He works regularly with some of the world's best orchestras, including the Berlin and Vienna Philharmonics, the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, and the London Symphony Orchestra. In two thousand-eighteenth he was named Artistic Director of the Anima Mundi Festival, and prior posts comprise music director of the Orchestre de Paris (2016–19) and principal visitor conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra (2007–17).
Harding began his career assisting Simon Rattle at the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, with which he made his professional debut in one thousand nine hundred ninety-fourth. He went on to assist Claudio Abbado at the Berlin Philharmonic and made his debut with that orchestra at the one thousand nine hundred ninety-six Berlin Festival.
