Jaap van Zweden

Jaap van Zweden (born 1960 in Amsterdam) is a Dutch conductor and violinist. A child violin prodigy, he won the Oskar Back competition at the age of 15, then went on to study at the Juilliard School in New York. At 19, he became the youngest concertmaster in the history of the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, a position he held from 1979 to 1995. He turned to conducting in the late 1990s. He was Principal Conductor of the Netherlands Symphony Orchestra (1996-2000), the Resident Orchestra of The Hague (2000-2005), the Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra (2005-2012) and the Antwerp Symphony Orchestra (2008-2011). Internationally, he has made a particular mark with the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, of which he was Music Director from 2008 to 2018, and the Hong Kong Philharmonic, which he conducted from 2012 to 2024. In 2018, he took over as Music Director of the New York Philharmonic, a position he held for six seasons until 2024, while developing a career as guest conductor with many renowned orchestras. He is now Music Director of the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra and Music Director Designate of the Orchestre philharmonique de Radio France. Following the live recording of Wagner's Ring with the Hong Kong Philharmonic with Matthias Goerne, Michelle DeYoung, Stuart Kelton and Eri Nakamura, Zweden pursued with the Brahms symphonic cycle, Shostakovich's Symphonies No. 5 & No. 9, Mahler's "Titan" Symphony (with the Seoul Philharmonic) and Steve Reich's Jacob's Ladder with percussionist Colin Currie and the New York Philharmonic.

Please enable Javascript to view this page competely.