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Stavanger Symfoniorkester (= SSO; English: Stavanger Symphony Orchestra) was founded in 1938 by the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation as the Stavanger musikerforenings orkester, for radio broadcasts. The orchestra's first artistic leader was the violinist Gunnar Knudsen, from 1938 to 1945. In 1965, the orchestra's name was changed to the Symfoniorkestret i Stavanger, and again in 1982 to its present name. The SSO has become one of the most successful orchestras in Scandinavia. The orchestra consists of 85 musicians from 23 different nations.
The SSO principal venue is the Stavanger Concert Hall (Stavanger konserthus), performing in the Fartein Valen concert hall, which is considered one of the best concert halls in Europe.
Past Artistic Leaders of the SSO have included Susanna Mälkki (2002-2005), and more recently the American conductor Steven Sloane (2007-2013). The SSO's most recent chief conductor was Christian Vásquez, from 2013 to 2019. In addition to its Chief Conductor, the SSO has appointed conductors with a formal principal responsibility for early music programming, including Frans Brüggen (1990-1997), Philippe Herreweghe (2000-2004), and Fabio Biondi (2006-2016). Ever since then, the SSO has continued to work regularly with exponents of historical performance practice including Kristian Bezuidenhout, Andrea Marcon, Jan Willem de Vriend, Matthew Halls, Ottavio Dantone, Riccardo Minasi, among others. In June 2019, the SSO announced the appointment of Andris Poga as its next Chief Conductor, effective with the 2021-2022 season. Jan Willem de Vriend is the orchestra’s current Conductor-in-Residence. Recent guest conductors have included Karina Canellakis, Pablo Heras-Casado, James Gaffigan, Stanislav Kochanovsky, Dalia Stasevska and Vassily Sinaisky.
The orchestra has a recording label of its own; besides, it has recorded lots of Scandinavian music for BIS, including music of Harald Sæverud, Geirr Tveitt and Fartein Valen; as well as Baroque music with Fabio Biondi for Naïve and other record companies. It has been touring in various European countries, Japan and the USA. SSO was nominated for Spellemann in 2018 for Gisle Kverndock’s Symphonic Dances and recieved two Hedda Awards i 2019, hence Best Performance, for The Mute. |
