Born in the Czech Republic, Jakub Hrůša is chief conductor of the Bamberg Symphony, music director designate of The Royal Opera, Covent Garden (music director from 2025), and principal guest conductor of the Czech Philharmonic. He was also formerly principal guest conductor of the Orchestra dell’Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, the Philharmonia Orchestra, and Tokyo Metropolitan Symphony Orchestra. He was the 2023 Opus Klassik Conductor of the Year.

He is a frequent guest with many of the world’s greatest orchestras, enjoying close relationships and performing regularly with the Vienna Philharmonic, Berlin Philharmonic, Bavarian Radio Symphony, Munich Philharmonic, Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra, Staatskapelle Dresden, Tonhalle Orchester Zürich, Lucerne Festival Orchestra, Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, Orchestre de Paris, Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, NHK Symphony and the Mahler Chamber Orchestra–and in the US with The Cleveland Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Chicago Symphony Orchestra, and Boston Symphony Orchestra. 

As a conductor of opera, he has led productions for the Lyric Opera of Chicago (Jenůfa), Salzburg Festival (Kát’aKabanová with the Vienna Philharmonic), Vienna State Opera (The Makropulos Case), Royal Opera House, Covent Garden (Carmen and Lohengrin), Opéra National de Paris (Rusalka), and Zurich Opera (The Makropulos Case). He has also been a regular guest with Glyndebourne Festival, conducting Vanessa, The Cunning Little Vixen, A Midsummer Night’s Dream, Carmen, The Turn of the Screw, Don Giovanni and La bohème, and served as music director of Glyndebourne On Tour for three years. 

His relationships with leading vocal and instrumental soloists have included collaborations in recent seasons with Behzod Abduraimov, Piotr Anderszewski, Leif Ove Andsnes, Emanuel Ax, Lisa Batiashvili, Joshua Bell, Yefim Bronfman, Rudolf Buchbinder, Renaud Capuçon, Gautier Capuçon, Isabelle Faust, Bernarda Fink, Julia Fischer, Sol Gabetta, Véronique Gens, Christian Gerhaher, Kirill Gerstein, Karen Gomyo, Hélène Grimaud, Augustin Hadelich, Hilary Hahn, Barbara Hannigan, Alina Ibragimova, Steven Isserlis, Janine Jansen, Sheku Kanneh-Mason, Leonidas Kavakos, Evgeny Kissin, Patricia Kopatchinskaja, Lang Lang, Igor Levit, Karita Mattila, Albrecht Mayer, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Stephanie d’Oustrac, Emmanuel Pahud, Beatrice Rana, Kian Soltani, Josef Špaček, Nikolaj Szeps-Znaider, Antoine Tamestit, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Daniil Trifonov, Mitsuko Uchida, Klaus Florian Vogt, Lukáš Vondráček, Yuja Wang, Alisa Weilerstein, and Frank Peter Zimmermann.

As a recording artist, Jakub Hrusa has received numerous awards and nominations. He was a double winner at the 2024 Gramophone Awards in both the Concerto and Opera categories, for his recordings of Britten’s Violin Concerto with Isabelle Faust and Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra, and Kát’a Kabanová with the Vienna Philharmonic at Salzburg Festival. With Bamberg Symphony, he received the ICMA Prize for Symphonic Music in both 2022 and 2023, for his recordings of Rott’s Symphony No. 1 and Bruckner’s Symphony No. 4. He was awarded the Preis der Deutschen Schallplattenkritik for his recording of Mahler’s Symphony No. 4, and in 2021 his recording of Martinů and Bartók violin concertos with Frank Peter Zimmermann was nominated for BBC Music Magazine and Gramophone awards, and his disc of the Dvořák Violin Concerto with the Bavarian Radio Symphony and Augustin Hadelich was nominated for a GRAMMY Award. His recordings of Dvořák and Martinů Piano Concertos with Ivo Kahánek and the Bamberg Symphony (Supraphon), and Vanessa from Glyndebourne (Opus Arte) both won BBC Music Magazine Awards in 2020. Other recent releases include Strauss songs with Bamberg Symphony and Kateřina Kněžíková (Supraphon), Dvořák and Brahms Symphonies with Bamberg Symphony (Tudor), Suk’s Asrael Symphony with the Bavarian Radio Symphony (BR Klassik), and Dvořák’s Requiem and Te Deum with the Czech Philharmonic (Decca).

Jakub Hrůša studied conducting at the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague, where his teachers included Jiří Bělohlávek. He is an Honorary Member of the Royal Academy of Music in London, and in 2024 received the Silver Medal of the President of the Czech Senate, its highest award. He was the inaugural recipient of the Sir Charles Mackerras Prize, and has also been awarded the Bavarian Culture Prize, the Czech Academy of Classical Music’s Antonín Dvořák Prize, and–together with Bamberg Symphony–the Bavarian State Prize for Music.

Following her recent residencies with Staatskapelle Dresden and Bamberger Symphoniker, Sol Gabetta opens the 2024-25 season with a tour of Europe with Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France and Mikko Franck. At the Wiener Konzerthaus, where Gabetta has thrilled audiences time and again, she will be featured in her portrait series across two chamber music evenings and as a soloist, performing concertos by Shostakovich and Saint-Saëns with Wiener Symphoniker and Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden. After her long-anticipated return to the U.S. for a debut with the New York Philharmonic and performances with The Cleveland Orchestra and Chicago Symphony Orchestra under the direction of Klaus Mäkelä, one of her most esteemed musical colleagues, Gabetta will join the New York Philharmonic and Jakub Hrůša in 2025 once again for a guest performance at the Bravo! Vail Music Festival in Colorado.

Gabetta maintains her longstanding connection to the Philharmonia Orchestra illuminating Weinberg’s Cello Concerto under the direction of Santtu-Matias Rouvali and returns to the Munchner Philharmoniker to collaborate with Lahav Shani after earning wide acclaim for her powerful rendition of Lutosławski’s Concerto for Cello and Orchestra last season. Upcoming engagements will see Gabetta reunite with Paavo Järvi and the Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich, as well as with Gewandhaus Orchestra led by Andris Nelsons. Other highlights included appearances with Constantinos Carydis and the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra in tribute performances to Shostakovich and Schnittke, two eminent composers who stood resilient against repression and remained vocal in their expression, and performances with Gabetta’s fellow ‘inventer’, violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja presenting known and unknown works as part of a tour of Germany, as well as apperances with Staatskapelle Berlin and Edward Gardner, performances with Concertgebouw Orchestra and a European tour with Oslo Philharmonic - both led by Klaus Mäkelä.

A respected advocate of new compositions for her instrument, Sol Gabetta gave the world premiere performance at Radio France of a newly commissioned Cello Concerto by Francisco Coll which was created especially for her. Gabetta recently brought this concerto to the BBC Proms with the BBC Symphony Orchestra, following a previous performance at the BBC Proms Japan, where she shared the stage at Tokyo’s Orchard Hall with the BBC Symphony Orchestra.

A sought-after guest artist at leading festivals, Sol Gabetta was Artiste étoile at Lucerne Festival where she appeared with Wiener Philharmoniker and Franz Welser-Möst, Mahler Chamber Orchestra and François-Xavier Roth and the London Philharmonic Orchestra directed by Marin Alsop. She continues drawing inspiration from a wide circle of collaborators and musical encounters at the Solsberg Festival, which flourishes under her committed artistic direction.

Chamber music is at the core of Gabetta’s work, visible in her upcoming trio recitals with Isabelle Faust and Alexander Melnikov, a tour with her longtime recital partner Bertrand Chamayou through Europe, and recent appearances with Kristian Bezuidenhout and Francesco Piemontesi at Gstaad Festival and at the Schubertiade. In the past, chamber music performances led her to venues such as New York’s Lincoln Center, Wigmore Hall in London, Lucerne, Verbier, Salzburg, Schwetzingen, and Rheingau festivals, Schubertiade Schwarzenberg and Beethovenfest Bonn.

In recognition of her exceptional artistic achievements, vision, and creativity, which have made a significant contribution to Europe’s cultural life, Sol Gabetta was honoured with the European Culture Prize in 2022. She also received the Herbert von Karajan Prize at the Salzburg Easter Festival in 2018 where she appeared as soloist with the Staatskapelle Dresden and Christian Thielemann. In 2019 she was awarded the first OPUS Klassik Award as Instrumentalist of the Year for her interpretation of Schumann’s Cello Concerto. The ECHO Klassik award saluted her accomplishments biennially between 2007 and 2013, and in 2016. A GRAMMY Award nominee, she also received the Gramophone Young Artist of the Year Award in 2010 and the Würth-Preis of the Jeunesses Musicales in 2012 as well as commendations at Moscow's Tchaikovsky Competition and the ARD International Music Competition in Munich. She continues to build her extensive discography with SONY Classical, the most recent releases being a recording of late Schumann works and a live recording of the cello concertos by Elgar and Martinů with Berliner Philharmoniker and Sir Simon Rattle / Krzysztof Urbański. In 2017, Gabetta joined forces with Cecilia Bartoli on an extensive tour throughout Europe showcasing their album Dolce Duello, released on Decca Classics.

Sol Gabetta performs on several Italian master instruments from the early 18th century, including a cello by Matteo Goffriller from 1730, Venice, provided to her by Atelier Cels Paris, and since 2020, the famous "Bonamy Dobree-Suggia" by Antonio Stradivarius from 1717, on generous loan from the Stradivari Foundation Habisreutinger. She has been teaching at the Basel Music Academy since 2005.