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Nearly two years have passed since the Chicago Symphony Orchestra announced Klaus Mäkelä would become its 11th music director in September 2027; excitement around the hire among the ensemble’s musicians has only grown since.
“Since the first time he conducted us in April 2022, people have just been very excited about working with him, and there has not been any diminishment of that," said William Buchman, the CSO’s assistant principal bassoon. "And the relationship has only grown deeper, as he is starting to assume the duties of music director.”
Although Mäkelä does not fully assume his new role for another 1½ years or so, the conductor is taking on more responsibilities as the CSO’s music director designate, including being involved in the hiring of new musicians and now leading his first tour with orchestra.
Mäkelä and the CSO will embark on a four-concert itinerary starting Feb. 23. It will begin at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor and then on to Carnegie Hall in New York City, as well as the Washington, D.C., area and Boston.
“It’s a historic moment because, it’s the first tour with Klaus, so it’s very exciting,” said Yuan-Qing Yu, assistant concertmaster. “The importance of that is on everyone’s mind.”
The orchestra has not appeared in Boston’s Symphony Hall since 2001, so this tour performance will mark an overdue return. The CSO has performed previously in the Washington, D.C., region (though never before in the Music Center at Strathmore) and Ann Arbor, and it is something of a regular at Carnegie Hall, one of the nation’s most storied venues.
“It’s good for us to be taking to other audiences this new relationship that we’re developing with Klaus, and I’m curious to see how the audiences and critics respond based on their previous experiences of us working with Maestro Muti, Bernard Haitink, Daniel Barenboim and being on the road,” said Buchman, who, along with Yu, was one of the six musicians on the search committee that selected Mäkelä.
On this tour, the orchestra will present two different programs. One will feature two works that Mäkelä and the CSO performed earlier in the 2025/26 season at Symphony Center: Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7 and Berlioz’s Symphonie fantastique. The other program consists of Richard Strauss’ Ein Heldenleben (A Hero’s Life) and Lemminkäinen, a suite of tone poems completed in 1896 by Finnish composer Jean Sibelius.
“So, all of these are big staples,” Yu said. “I think it’s really great repertoire to showcase the orchestra and also what Klaus is passionate about.”
In the four years since Makela made his CSO debut, Yu’s initial positive impressions of him have only strengthened. “He is super-talented,” she said. “That’s without a doubt. He’s one of the rare talents in our time right now. His capacity for different repertoire, and his knowledge and his curiosity is really impressive.”
She also described him as good time manager in rehearsals and someone who is “really great with interpersonal relationships.”
In 2024/25, Mäkelä conducted just two weeks of concerts. He is gradually expanding his time with the orchestra in the 2025/26 and 2026/2027 seasons, as he winds down his tenures as chief conductor of the Oslo Philharmonic and music director of the Orchestre de Paris.
Since his CSO appointment, he has been involved with the hirings of a half dozen or so musicians, starting with the January 2025 appointment of Gabriela Lara to the first violin section. Other more recent hirings have included Paolo Dara, viola, and Timothy Higgins as principal trombone.
Buchman believes a level of trust is developing between the musicians and Mäkelä as they learn how he views the CSO and what his priorities are as the orchestra seeks new members. “He’s been keeping a really open dialogue with musicians about what inspires him,” Buchman said. “Especially with members of the audition committee, [he’s candid about] what qualities he is looking for in musicians to add to the orchestra to have it evolve it in a direction that he thinks is positive for us.”
Mäkelä will be 31 when he fully takes the reins as music director in September 2027 — the youngest person to ever hold the position.
“The thing that was so remarkable about Klaus, the first time we worked with him — I think he would have been 27 — is that he immediately overcame any skepticism that might have been there and convinced people that he was a serious musician with a valid point of view who was going to be able to allow us to create music at the level we want to,” Buchman said.
Mäkelä has demonstrated a comprehensive, well-researched understanding of bedrock works, such as Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 5, that the musicians know intimately. “He also brings a very youthful perspective and energy to it,” Buchman said. “We’ve found that he’s allowing the orchestra to play slightly more unreined, and some people are finding it refreshing.”
East Coast Tour 2026 itinerary
Feb. 23, Hill Auditorium, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Feb. 25, Carnegie Hall, New York City
Feb. 27, Music Center at Strathmore, North Bethesda, Maryland, Washington (D.C.) Performing Arts
March 1, Symphony Hall, Boston
