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An unusual combination of 20th-century Russian masterworks herald debut appearances by both conductor and soloist in Sydney.

Putting Gershwin up against Mahler is a challenge, but Simone Young and Jean-Yves Thibaudet bring it off in the Sydney Symphony's 2026 season opener. 

Terrific orchestral colours abound in this Sydney Symphony concert under Simone Young, adding to a thoughtful and emotive rendering of one of the best-known cello concertos.

A delightful programme welcomes conductor Lionel Bringuier and returning cellist Daniel Müller-Schott to Sydney.

Three very different works from the long life of Richard Strauss are performed by the Sydney Symphony Orchestra under Simone Young.

Stephen Layton conducts Haydn and Handel, and is joined by soprano Sara Macliver for Bach and Mozart for a joyful evening. 

Elim Chan expertly conducts the SSO through a varied programme featuring an Australian fanfare, Russian ballet music and Brahms' First Piano Concerto with Sir Stephen Hough. 

After so many terrific concerts in the last few months, Petrenko's performance with the SSO does not quite fulfill expectations.

Wotan's predicaments provide Sydney's victory: Chief Conductor Simone Young has her musicians on some of their best form in recent years, with only a few question marks over an excellent concert performance.

In the run-up to Bastille Day, the Sydney Symphony Orchestra offers an entirely French programme under the baton of Stéphane Denève, with Olivier Latry as organ soloist.

Making her debut on the conductor’s podium, Han-Na Chang’s enthusiastic musicality makes a strong impression at the Sydney Opera House, in Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto no. 2 and Tchaikovsky’s Fifth Symphony.

Can a perfect performance of the stupendous Gurrelieder be anything other than five stars?

A powerful season-opening concert featuring Renaud Capuçon playing the Australian premiere of Camille Pépin's Violin Concerto Le Sommeil a pris ton empreinte. 

The first programme in Stephen Hough's Sydney series sees him offer sensitive but not incandescent Rachmaninov, followed by thrilling performances of Respighi's Roman Trilogy under John Wilson. 

Donald Runnicles demonstrates his superior musicianship in a warm, intelligently crafted reading of Brahms' Symphony no. 2 in D major, with Andrea Lam as a sensitive and reserved soloist in Robert Schumann's Piano Concerto.

A thrilling account of Mahler's First Symphony under Simone Young launches the Sydney Symphony Orchestra's 2023 season, with Mahler's Blumine and Debussy's Ariettes oubliées on the undercard.

Simone Young  is made of stern stuff. With 30 hours to go before the concert performance, her Leonore falls ill. Can the show go on? 

Antonín Dvořák’s Cello Concerto takes Sydney audiences to Czech forests before Eduardo Strausser conducts excerpts from Prokofiev's Romeo and Juliet. 

Hahn’s practically faultless rendering also offered a most pleasing freshness and joy of spontaneity.

Simone Young marks the start of her tenure at the helm of the Sydney Symphony with a performance that showcases the outstanding acoustics of the renovated Concert Hall.

An afternoon programme by the Sydney Symphony Orchestra featuring Beethoven's Triple Concerto and Brahms' Third and shorter pieces by Schreker and Harry Sdraulig offers pleasant but somewhat underwhelming impressions.

Mahler and Schubert: masters of both song and symphony. Jacqueline Porter is the soloist as the SSO under Umberto Clerici perform Schubert arrangements and Mahler's classical Fourth Symphony.

The Sydney Symphony, temporarily rehoused in the ornate Victorian style Town Hall, plays grandiose Wagner and safe Stravinsky. 

As the Sydney Opera House Concert Hall closes for extensive refurbishment, the Sydney Symphony Orchestra performs early, massive Mahler under Simone Young. 

Contrasting works as the Sydney Symphony tackles Les Offrandes oubliées and Bruckner's Seventh Symphony.

C minor and C major are at the centre of Masaaki Suzuki's Haydn and Beethoven programme with the Sydney Symphony. 

Imogen Cooper joined the Sydney Symphony for a performance of Beethoven's Second Piano Concerto. 

‘Dancing with the Orchestra’ was the last subscription concert of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra and two compositions with a focus on dance bookended Béla Bartók’s Violin Concerto no. 2. 

This week’s subscription concerts of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra featured only British music that was composed in the last century; three very different works in terms of compositional approach and musical language.

The Sydney Symphony Orchestra scored a major win when they engaged Daniil Trifonov to visit for three orchestral concerts and a solo recital. 

One could hardly dream of a better concert to open the season than one featuring Maxim Vengerov as the guest soloist in Johannes Brahms' Violin Concerto in D major.

A tribute concert to the passing of the grand old man of Finnish music, Einojuhani Rautavaara, offers a programme that focusses on sonic beauty at the expense of a more rounded appreciation of the composer's output.

Take an overture from the Classical period, add a Romantic concerto and finish with a major work from the 20th century – a tried and proven concoction for a balanced orchestral concert. If these works follow a chronological order and become increasingly longer, so much the better.

The SSO left its usual venue to perform Gustav Mahler’s monumental Symphony no. 2 in C minor in the Sydney Town Hall.

The Sydney Symphony in a finely chiselled account of Vaughan Williams' “A London Symphony”, but groped for balance in Ravel and Bax.

Two days after his stimulating solo recital, Lang Lang returned to the Concert Hall of the Sydney Opera House for Grieg’s Piano Concerto.

Masaaki Suzuki’s debut with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra.

Sydney's Indian Summer brightened by Russian themes. 

Both guest artists of the Sydney Symphony Orchestra’s concerts this week appeared in Australia for the first time: the octogenarian Christoph von Dohnányi and the versatile violinist, less than half his age, Carolin Widmann. The great German conductor must feel a certain pride in his ancestry, as he kept the Hungarian spelling of his surname.

A rare opportunitiy to hear Messiaen's Des canyons aux étoiles in Sydney. 

Contrasts abounding in serenades by Mozart and Strauss. 

Beethoven truly celebrated in Sydney, as another symphony cycle progresses. 

Beautifully interpreted performance of Mozart and Elgar at Sydney's Opera House, with Ross Edwards' White Ghosts Dancing. 

Alan Holley's Oboe Concerto formed the centrepiece of Miguel Harth-Bedoya's Sydney Symphony programme. 

Mozart and the Brits offered the chance to hear Britten and rarely performed Malcolm Arnold, courtesy of the Sydney Symphony. 

Anne-Sophie Mutter impresses Sydney in Dvořák and Beethoven, before a less magnetic “Eroica”. 

It is not often that the nominal title of a concert would consist of simply the name of its protagonists. Yet this is exactly what happened this week when the Sydney Symphony Orchestra’s programme was called with laconic brevity: Cirque de la Symphonie.

Charles Dutoit displays his expertise in Berlioz and Respighi in a fine evening with the Sydney Symphony. 

A performance of Wagner’s epic Tristan und Isolde, a testimony for all-enduring love, is a welcome event anywhere in the world. 

Summer Nights on a winter's afternoon in Sydney, as Katarina Karnéus performs Berlioz with the Sydney Symphony.