Dalia Stasevska
Stasevska’s charismatic and dynamic musicianship has established her as a conductor of exceptional versatility. Chief Conductor of Lahti Symphony Orchestra and Artistic Director to the International Sibelius Festival, Dalia also holds the post of Principal Guest Conductor of BBC Symphony Orchestra. She has made several appearances at the BBC Proms including the First Night of the Proms in 2023.

In 2023/24, Dalia will guest conduct The Cleveland Orchestra, Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra,Danish National Symphony Orchestra, hr-Sinfonieorchester, Deutsches Symphonie-OrchesterBerlin, Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, Seattle Symphony Orchestra, Berner Symphonieorchester, Sydney Symphony Orchestra and West Australian Symphony Orchestra.

Recent engagements have included orchestras such as New York Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, San Francisco Symphony, Toronto Symphony Orchestra, The Philadelphia Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, the National Symphony Orchestra and Netherlands Radio Philharmonic Orchestra at the Concertgebouw Hall, Amsterdam.

Last season, with BBC Symphony Orchestra, she embarked on a six-concert tour to Japan with soloists Sol Gabetta, Nicola Benedetti and Roderick Williams. In spring 2024, Dalia and BBC Symphony Orchestra collaborate on a Total Immersion project focussing on Missy Mazzoli. Performing works of living composers is a core part of Dalia’s programming, and with Lahti Symphony Orchestra, they present works by Andrew Norman, Thomas Adès, Helen Grime, KaijaSaariaho and Outi Tarkianen, to name a few.

A passionate opera conductor, 2023 saw Dalia’s highly successful debut at the Glyndebourne Opera Festival with a revival of the iconic Peter Hall production of Britten’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream. In previous seasons, she returned to Finnish National Opera and Ballet to conduct a double bill of Poulenc’s La voix humane and Weill’s Songs with Karita Mattila, and to Norske Opera to conduct Madama Butterfly and Lucia di Lammermoor. Other productions include Don Giovanni with Kungliga Opera Stockholm, directed by Ole Anders Tandberg, Cunning Little Vixen with Finnish National Opera and Sebastian Fagerlund’s Höstsonaten at the 2018 Baltic Sea Festival in Stockholm, featuring Anne-Sofie von Otter.

Her debut solo album Dalia’s Mixtape with BBC Symphony Orchestra released in Spring 2024 on Platoon features ten tracks of some of the freshest sounds in contemporary music. Released one month at a time with music by genre-bending composers such as Anna Meredith, Caroline Shaw, Andrea Tarrodi, Noriko Koide, Judith Weir and others. In June 2023 together with Lahti Symphony Orchestra and pianist Olli Mustonen, she released piano concerti by Rautavaara and Martinu on BIS.

Dalia originally studied as a violinist and composer at the Tampere Conservatoire and subsequently violin, viola and conducting at the Sibelius Academy. As a conductor her teachers include Jorma Panula and Leif Segerstam. In December 2018, she had the honour of conducting Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra at the Nobel Prize Ceremony in Stockholm. She was awarded the Royal Philharmonic Society’s Conductor Award in 2020, Alfred Kordelin Prize in 2022 and BBC Music Magazine’s Personality of the Year award in 2023.

Dalia was bestowed the Order of Princess Olga of the III degree by President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in October 2020 for her significant personal contribution to the development of international cooperation, strengthening the prestige of Ukraine internationally and popularisation of its historical and cultural heritage. Since February 2022, she has actively been supporting Ukraine by raising donations to buy supplies and on a number of occasions delivering them herself.