hr-Sinfonieorchester

The hr-Sinfonieorchester Frankfurt, founded in 1929 as one of the first radio symphony orchestras in Germany, today masters the challenges of a modern top orchestra with great success.

Famous for its outstanding wind players, its powerful strings and its dynamic playing culture, the orchestra of the Hessischer Rundfunk with its chief conductor Alain Altinoglu stands for musical excellence as well as for an interesting and versatile repertoire.

With innovative concert formats, internationally successful digital offerings and CD productions, as well as its constant presence in important music centers in Europe and Asia, the hr-Sinfonieorchester underscores its prominent position in the European orchestral landscape and enjoys an outstanding reputation worldwide as the Frankfurt Radio Symphony.

Known for its standard-setting first recordings of the original versions of Bruckner’s symphonies and the first complete digital recording of all Mahler symphonies, the hr-Sinfonieorchester established a tradition in the interpretation of Romantic literature, The orchestra established a tradition in the interpretation of Romantic literature that radiated from its longstanding principal conductor and current honorary conductor Eliahu Inbal to his successors Dmitrij Kitajenko and Hugh Wolff to the era of the current “Conductor Laureate” Paavo Järvi and to Andrés Orozco-Estrada, who most recently led the orchestra for seven years with great success as principal conductor.

The orchestra set decisive accents in its commitment to tradition as well as to contemporary music with its first principal conductor Hans Rosbaud immediately after its founding. After the Second World War and reconstruction under Kurt Schröder, Winfried Zillig and Otto Matzerath, the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra finally developed into an orchestra of international stature in the 1960s to 1980s under Dean Dixon and Eliahu Inbal, with guest performances all over the world and important, multi-award-winning record and CD editions.