Performer: The Cleveland Orchestra

Works by Crumb, Ruggles, Barber and Gershwin offer four distinct ideas of what American music can sound like in Barbara Hannigan’s explorative Cleveland Orchestra program.

Following a polished account of Mozart’s Jupiter Symphony, Shostakovich’s Eleventh erupted with visceral force, as Franz Welser-Möst led The Cleveland Orchestra in a performance of gripping intensity.

Asmik Grigorian leads a strong quartet of soloists and the Cleveland Orchestra Chorus shape the performance at Carnegie Hall. 

The Hong Kong-born conductor talks about her entry into music, her love of big Russian repertoire, her “Cinderella moment” winning the Donatella Flick Conducting Competition and her ambition to “go against the grind”. 

The conductor who transformed The Cleveland Orchestra into one of the world's leading ensembles died on 6th September 2025, just two days before his 96th birthday.

Bachtrack polled 15 of the world's leading music critics and can reveal their 2023 list of the world's greatest orchestras and conductors.