Esa-Pekka Salonen’s restless innovation drives him constantly to reposition classical music in the 21st century. In 2020, he will become the Music Director of the San Francisco Symphony. Until the end of the season 2020-2021, he is the Principal Conductor and Artistic Advisor for London’s Philharmonia Orchestra, where the award-winning RE-RITE and Universe of Sound installations have allowed people all over the world to step inside the orchestra through audio and video projections. Salonen also drove the development of a much-hailed app for iPad, The Orchestra, which gives the user unprecedented access to the internal workings of eight symphonic works. As the Music Director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, where he is now Conductor Laureate, Salonen was instrumental in opening the Frank Gehry-designed Walt Disney Concert Hall and made the orchestra one of the best attended and funded in the country. He is the Marie-Josée Kravis Composer-in-Residence at the New York Philharmonic and Artist in Association at the Finnish National Opera and Ballet. Additionally, Salonen is Artistic Director and cofounder of the annual Baltic Sea Festival.

German-Hungarian violinist Zsolt-Tihamér Visontay is a laureate of several international solo prizes. His solo engagements include performing with a number of German orchestras. In 2005 he became Leader of the European Union Youth Orchestra (EUYO), performing under conductors including h and a year later he also became Concert Master of the Philharmonic Orchestra in Altenburg-Gera. He has led orchestras such as the Radio Symphony Orchestra Berlin, Hamburg Philharmonic, London Symphony Orchestra, Academy of St Martin in the Fields, Royal Scottish National Orchestra, Orchestra Nacional de Porto, City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra and Bamberg Symphony Orchestra, touring throughout Europe, Russia, Asia and the US.
In 2007, at the age of 24, he became Joint Concert Master of the Philharmonia Orchestra. Since then his solo engagements with the Orchestra have included performing The Lark Ascending under both David Hill and Sir Andrew Davis. He has recorded the John Jeffreys Violin Concerto with the Philharmonia and Paul Bateman. In addition he has acted as violinist/director with the Philharmonia and the Academy of St Martin in the Fields.
Established as a sought-after chamber musician, he has performed and recorded Bartók's Contrasts with Mark van de Wiel and Yefim Bronfman; and has recorded Rachmaninov piano trios with Mats Lidstroem and Vladimir Ashkenazy.
Collaborating with those artists already mentioned as well as many others including Min-Jung Kym and Jamie Walton, he performs in major venues such as the Mozartsaal, Vienna; Salle Gaveau, Paris; and Wigmore Hall, London.

As principal clarinet of the Philharmonia Orchestra and the London Sinfonietta, and a well-known soloist, Mark van de Wiel performs at major venues throughout the world. He has given several London premieres in the Philharmonia’s Music of Today series, and elsewhere the Spanish première of the Carter Concerto, the UK première of the Carter Clarinet Quintet, and of Sir John Taverner’s Cantus Mysticus (at the Proms), and the London première of Graham Fitkin’s Agnostic. Recordings include Ben Foskett’s Hornet, Philip Cashian’s Blue Circus and Flint Juventino Beppe’s Distant Words with the Philharmonia and Vladimir Ashkenazy.

Mark has been the clarinettist with Endymion since its formation in 1980. Other chamber music collaborators have included Pascal Rogé, Geoffrey Parsons, Elizabeth Leonskaja, Kate Royal and the Brodsky Quartet, with whom he gave the London première of Sir Peter Maxwell Davies’s Hymn to Artemis Locheia. With Zsolt-Tihamėr Visontay and Yefim Bronfman he gave several performances of Bartok’s Contrasts in the Philharmonia’s Bartok series Infernal Dance. Other highlights have included the Mozart Quintet in Brazil, and the Berio Sequenza at the Sydney Opera House.

Mark was appointed principal clarinettist with Welsh National Opera and subsequently with Glyndebourne Touring Opera. He joined the Philharmonia as principal clarinet in 2000, and the London Sinfonietta in 2002. He is also principal with the London Chamber Orchestra (with whom he has appeared as soloist at La Scala, Milan). For several years he was the clarinet and basset horn soloist in Mozart’s Clemenza di Tito at the Bayerisches Staatsoper. Mark is the clarinet professor for the I, Culture Orchestra, and for the British Isles Music Festival. He is a committed teacher, and has given masterclasses world-wide.