One of the most sought-after conductors of our time, Greek-American Karina Canellakis, makes her first appearance at the Athens Concert Hall on Friday, February 23 at 8:30 p.m., as head of the London Philharmonic Orchestra.

The sought-after conductor at Megaro Moysikis

The London Philharmonic Orchestra, which in 2020 appointed Canellakis to the position of first guest principal musician, a position held by a woman for the first time in the history of the ensemble, will play for one night at the Megaro, and the concert tickets sold out immediately.

Joining the historic British Orchestra and the world-renowned conductor is German virtuoso violinist Christian Tetzlaff, who will perform Dmitri Shostakovich's explosive First Violin Concerto in B minor. On the same evening, the audience will also have the opportunity to enjoy two compositions from the 19th century repertoire: Johannes Brahms's imposing Fourth Symphony in E minor and the Prelude ("Dawn on the Moskva River") from the opera Khovanstsina by Modest Mussorgsky [Modest Mussorgsky].

Karina Canellakis conducting
Internationally recognized for her emotionally charged approaches, her technical perfection and the depth of her interpretations, Karina Kanellakis is one of the most sought-after conductors of her generation. He holds the positions of Principal Chief Musician of the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic and Principal Guest Chief Musician of the London Philharmonic Orchestra, with whom he appears this year in Athens, Munich and Vienna.

This season, she conducts, among others, as Artist-in-Residence of the famous Musikverein Vienna, the Vienna Symphony Orchestras and the Austrian Radio (ORF) in works by Janáček, Shostakovich and Beethoven. Also, as a guest principal musician, she collaborates with the Boston Symphony, the Cleveland Orchestra, the San Francisco Symphony and other well-known orchestras, while she collaborates with the Amsterdam Concertgebouw as well as the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic in both contemporary and classical repertoire.

After the great success of her collaboration with Janacek's last set of operas, she conducts, this year's artistic season, the same composer's "Makropoulos Affair". Her operatic repertoire also includes works by Richard Strauss, Richard Wagner, Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and others.

The London Philharmonic Orchestra, which in 2020 appointed Canellakis as its first guest principal, a position held by a woman for the first time in the ensemble's history, will play for one night at Megaros

After winning the Georg Solti Conducting Competition (2016), Karina Kanellakis has collaborated with top ensembles around the world, and was the first woman to conduct the BBC Proms premiere in London (2019) and the concert for Nobel Prize in Stockholm (2018).

Karina Kanellakis, before turning to conducting at the urging of Sir Simon Rattle, had a remarkable artistic career as a master violinist, both as a soloist and as a member of chamber music ensembles, while she also had a two-year collaboration with the Orchester-Akademie of the Philharmonic Berlin.

Karina Kanellakis is one of the most sought-after conductors of her generation
The concert at Megaro is sponsored by Piraeus Bank as part of the EQUALL Corporate Responsibility Program. The presence of Karina Canellakis emphatically highlights key social issues linked to the elimination of gender stereotypes. Issues that constitute the core of the EQUALL program, through which Piraeus Bank develops initiatives that promote the empowerment of women and contribute to the formation of an inclusive society.