Athens State Orchestra

The Athens State Orchestra is Greece’s oldest orchestral ensemble. Founded in the late nineteenth-century as the Athens Conservatory Symphony Orchestra, it performed its first concert as the Athens State Orchestra on February 28, 1943.

Since its foundation, the Orchestra has performed over fifty concerts annually, in Athens and other Greek cities, as well as at renowned international venues and festivals. Its educational and social programming in Athens and throughout Greece is also noteworthy.

The Orchestra has a long history of outstanding collaborators, among them the eminent conductors Richard Strauss, Felix Weingartner, Hans Knappertsbusch, Bruno Walter, Dimitri Mitropoulos, Eugen Jochum, Igor Markevitch, Lorin Maazel, Yuri Temirkanov, Michel Plasson, Vladimir Ashkenazy and Vladimir Fedoseyef; in addition to many renowned soloists, including Arthur Rubenstein, Wilhelm Kempff, Alfred Cortot, Fritz Kreisler, Jacques Thibaud, Pablo Casals, Mstislav Rostropovich, Alfred Brendel, Daniel Barenboim, Martha Argerich, Elisabeth Leonskaya and Leonidas Kavakos.

Among its former Artistic Directors, the Orchestra counts Filoktitis Oikonomidis, Theodoros Vavagiannis, Andreas Paridis, Manos Hadjidakis, Giannis Ioannidis, Alexandros Symeonidis, Aris Garoufalis, Byron Fidetzis and Vassilis Christopoulos. Since May 2014, Stefanos Tsialis has been the Athens State Orchestra’s Artistic Director.