Riccardo Chailly

Riccardo Chailly stands out as a forceful and occasionally polarizing figure on the podium, celebrated for championing new music and for reinterpreting the core symphonic canon through contemporary lenses. Among his extensive Decca releases are landmark scores by Zemlinsky, Hindemith, and Schnittke, the full cycle of Gustav Mahler symphonies, and an array of operatic productions. Decca brought out a comprehensive Stravinsky collection under his direction in 2021, while he also directed the La Scala Theater Orchestra for soprano Anna Netrebko’s recital disc Amata dalle Tenebre.

Born in Milan on February 20, 1953, the conductor is the son of composer Luciano Chailly and once played drums in rhythm-and-blues bands. He launched his career as Claudio Abbado’s assistant at La Scala, where he gained experience with the established operatic repertoire. Independent successes followed at Covent Garden, the Metropolitan Opera, and various Italian and German theaters; a notable early recording paired him with Luciano Pavarotti in Giordano’s Andrea Chénier. Preferring broader artistic scope, he shifted emphasis to symphonic work, assuming leadership of the Berlin Radio Symphony Orchestra in 1982 and guiding that ensemble on its inaugural North American tour three years later. Between 1982 and 1985 he also served as principal guest conductor of the London Philharmonic.

At age thirty-five the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra—recently renamed—appointed him chief conductor and artistic director in 1988, a post that became the cornerstone of his activities and prompted him to curtail guest engagements elsewhere. Initial friction arose from his streamlined, coloristic treatment of Bruckner, Mahler, and Brahms, which departed from the orchestra’s customary sonority in favor of a more supple timbral range suited to each composer. Once the ensemble adapted, Chailly steered it with assurance, sustaining its stature among Europe’s elite orchestras while fostering experimentation and renewed interpretive vitality. He departed the Concertgebouw in 2004; Mariss Jansons succeeded him.

From 1999 to 2005 Chailly served as the founding music director of the Orchestra Sinfonica Giuseppe Verdi. In 2005 he took the helm of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, remaining until 2016. Milan’s La Scala named him music director in 2015, and the following year he assumed the same title with the Lucerne Festival Orchestra. Additional appearances have included the Berlin Philharmonic, the New York Philharmonic, and the Chicago Symphony.

Chailly has long advocated for Edgard Varèse and Alexander Zemlinsky, composers he regards as insufficiently recognized. He also explores historically informed practices from the Baroque period; in Bach’s St. Matthew Passion he seeks equilibrium between modern orchestral resources and period-appropriate articulation. His operatic discography features several distinguished Rossini projects, among them a La Cenerentola highlighting Cecilia Bartoli. In 2019 he issued a recording devoted to Nino Rota’s scores for Federico Fellini films and led a La Scala staging of Puccini’s Madama Butterfly. The year 2021 saw both the Netrebko collaboration and Decca’s release of the complete Stravinsky Edition drawn from his recordings; the Lucerne Festival Orchestra simultaneously extended his contract through 2026.