The new Chief Conductor of the Helsinki Philharmonic makes his debut with the English Chamber Orchestra on 25 May and has return engagements with the BBC Symphony Orchestra and the Scottish Chamber Orchestra. Storgårds’ next recording of Kalevi Aho’s Symphony No. 12 will be released at the end of June

Hanover, 12 March 2008. With his appointment as the new Chief Conductor of the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra, John Storgårds joins the ranks of today's leading international conductors. The 44-year-old native of Finland will take up his new position in September 2008, succeeding Leif Segerstam. At the same time, Storgårds, who has recorded over

30 CDs, is further enlarging his sphere of activity within Europe. During the next seven months he will conduct three renowned orchestras in the UK – the BBC Symphony Orchestra at the Barbican Centre on 18 April, the Scottish Chamber Orchestra in Edinburgh and Glasgow on 10 and 11 April and, for the first time, the English Chamber Orchestra in London's Cadogan Hall. He has been a welcome guest with the BBC Symphony Orchestra since 2005 and has worked regularly with the Scottish Chamber Orchestra since 2001.

The Swedish label BIS will release his latest CD on June 30 – Kalevi Aho's Symphony

No.12, with John Storgårds conducting the Lahti Symphony Orchestra and the Lapland Chamber Orchestra.

Storgårds, who has made a name for himself both as a violinist and a conductor, is an artist outside the mainstream, who is particularly known for his innovative concert programmes – he often performs rarely played works and contemporary music. The concert with the BBC Symphony Orchestra on 18 April will include the UK premiere of Brett Dean’s Clarinet Concerto, with Michael Collins as soloist, and a performance of Sibelius’ music for The Tempest, with actors reading from the original play. The concerts in Scotland this April are a collaboration with Truls Mørk, with whom Storgårds will perform Haeflidi Hallgrímsson’s Cello Concerto Op. 30, followed by recording sessions of both Hallgrímsson’s concerti for the instrument, for Ondine.

He will return to Scottish Chamber Orchestra in October, again to conduct a rarity – Beethoven's Consecration of the House Overture, in addition to the composer's Piano Concerto No. 5, with Simon Trpceski at the piano.