Münchner Symphoniker

The Münchner Symphoniker, also known as the Munich Symphony Orchestra, describes itself on its website as "the Sound of Our City." While its core work as a concert ensemble has centered on performances across Munich, Bavaria, and southern Germany, the group has earned particular international recognition for its extensive contributions to film scores.

Kurt Graunke established the ensemble in 1945, and it operated under the name Graunke Symphony Orchestra until 1990, with Graunke serving as its conductor through 1989. Its inaugural performance took place on September 25, 1945, as a Red Cross benefit concert in Munich. The orchestra presented its first subscription series in 1949, after which its annual schedule expanded to roughly 100 concerts, most of them now staged at the Herkluessaal, the Prinzregententheater, and the Philharmonie am Gasteig in Munich. Every principal conductor has been German; Graunke’s successors have included Christoph Stepp, Heiko Mathias Förster, Georg Schmöhe, and, beginning in 2014, Kevin John Edusei, whose background is Ghanaian-German.

From an international perspective, the Münchner Symphoniker is most widely identified with its film-score recordings, having contributed to more than 500 soundtracks, many of them prominent and drawn from outside Germany. Among these are the Walt Disney production Sleeping Beauty (1959), whose score adapts Tchaikovsky’s music through Georg Bruns; the 1975 adventure film The Wind and the Lion, featuring Jerry Goldsmith’s music; and The Silence of the Lambs (1991), scored by Howard Shore. The orchestra also appeared on the soundtrack for the television series The Young Indiana Jones Chronicles.

Its discography encompasses film scores alongside crossover releases such as the 1992 album Plays ABBA Classics and conventional orchestral repertory. In 2019 the ensemble issued a recording of Schubert’s Symphony No. 5 in B flat major, D. 485, paired with Symphony No. 6 in C major, D. 589 (“Little C major”), under Edusei’s direction.