Scandinavium Side by Side 2023: Festival Concert

The Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra was founded in 1905 and currently consists of 109 musicians. The orchestra is based in Gothenburg Concert Hall – a gem of functionalism on Götaplatsen square that has enchanted music lovers since 1935. Wilhelm Stenhammar was the orchestra’s Chief Conductor from 1907 until 1922. He gave the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra a strong Nordic profile and invited his colleagues Carl Nielsen and Jean Sibelius to collaborate with the orchestra. Under the leadership of Chief Conductor Neeme Järvi between 1982 and 2004, the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra undertook a number of international tours and made a hundred or so album recordings while establishing itself as one of Europe’s foremost orchestras. In 1997 the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra received the title of the National Orchestra of Sweden. Since season 2017-2018 Santtu-Matias Rouvali is Chief Conductor of the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra. Since season 2019-2020 Barbara Hannigan is Principal Guest Conductor. Christoph Eschenbach was also Principal Guest Conductor of Gothenburg Symphony in the years 2019-2022 – together they formed a strong three-leaf clover consisting of three completely different types of artists. We are also extremely proud to be an official partner of soprano Barbara Hannigan’s mentor initiative Equilibrium, with focus on young singers and musicians who are just beginning their careers. Sten Cranner is the orchestra’s CEO and Artistic Director, while Gustavo Dudamel holds the title of Honorary Conductor and Neeme Järvi that of Principal Conductor Emeritus. Region Västra Götaland is owner of the orchestra. The Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra works regularly with conductors such as Herbert Blomstedt, Joana Carneiro, Jukka-Pekka Saraste, Christian Zacharias and Anja Bihlmaier.

“Ron Davis Alvarez is a man accustomed to making miracles” (The New York Times). Selected, in 2017, as one of the world's 50 best teachers by the Varkey Foundation, as part of the Global Teacher Prize, known as the Nobel Prize for teaching, Venezuelan Ron Davis Alvarez is specialized in training teachers for children and youth orchestras. He has lectured conferences and master classes with teachers from Colombia, Mexico, United States, Chile, United Kingdom, Denmark, Italy, Germany, France, Greenland, Sweden, Turkey, South Korea, Ecuador, Finland and Greece, in the latter he taught in a refugee camp. In 2016, Ron Davis Alvarez created in Gothenburg, Sweden, the Dream Orchestra with children and teens aged between 8 and 19 years, refugees from the violence in Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, Kurdistan, Albania, Eritrea and Somalia. The objective has been to integrate them into Swedish society. This group, which already has more than 50 members, is also distinguished because its musicians have never played an instrument before. The model of the Dream Orchestra is being emulated in several European countries. Product of the renowned Venezuelan musical and social program, known as El Sistema, Alvarez was formed at Miranda State, Venezuela, as a violinist, orchestra conductor, teacher and cultural manager. Alvarez founded in 2011 an orchestra located 700 kilometers away from the Arctic Circle at the Uummannaq Children's House in Greenland, the first orchestra of Inuit children in El Sistema. His main mentors are maestro José Antonio Abreu, Franka Verhagen, Igor Lanz, Gregory Carreño, Ruben Cova, Ann Andreasen, Victor Vivas and Tupac Amaru.

Birgitta Mannerström-Molin is a choir conductor and singing teacher. She also teaches at the University of Stage and Music in Gothenburg and is involved as a course instructor and choir conductor at national level. She has also been involved in the development of El Sistema in Sweden and is the conductor and artistic advisor for Side by Side by El Sistema, which is performed every year by the Gothenburg Symphony. In 2016, Birgitta Mannerström-Molin was appointed Children's and Youth Choir leader of the Year. She is also a teacher at Hvitfeldtska Musikgymnasiet and project leader for young people at Sweden's Church Song Association.

For more than 15 years Manuel López-Gómez' worked side by side with Gustavo Dudamel on symphonic and opera projects such as La Bohème, La Traviata and Mahler's Eighth Symphony in Caracas, Don Giovanni in Los Angeles, the Brahms Symphonies in Paris and West Side Story with Cecilia Bartoli at the Salzburg Festival. In 2017-18, Manuel shared with him the musical direction of a new production of La Bohème at the Opéra Bastille in Paris. Manuel López-Gómez' reputation is established by successful appearances in North and Latin America, Europe, Asia and Australia. For Universal Music Italy he conducted and recorded the world premiere of the recently orchestrated opera Atahualpa by Carlo Enrico Pasta in Peru. Shortly after, he returned to this country for Gounod's Roméo et Juliette with Juan Diego Flórez. The Rossini Opera Festival in Pesaro invited him for a production of Il Viaggio a Reims, and the Kristiansand Symphony Orchestra for Le Nozze di Figaro. Having been formed within El Sistema, he sees the dedication to young people and their musical training as a major duty of his profession. Currently, he fulfils this particular commitment as Music Director of the Bogotá Philharmonic Youth Orchestra.

Italian conductor Daniela Musca has been a recurring conductor at Side by Side since 2020. In the 2022-2023 season, she has appeared with the symphony orchestras in both Malmö, Turkku and Luxemburg, as well as with the Wermland Opera in Karlstad, the Stockholm Wind Orchestra and Östgötamusiken. In 2021, she made her debut at the Royal Opera in Stockholm with Rigoletto. She has conducted orchestras including the Gothenburg Symphony, Norrköping Symphony, Trondheim Symphony, Casco Phil, Frankfurt Opera and Museum Orchestra, Würzburg Philharmonic and Oulu Sinfonia. Born in Rome, she studied piano and chamber music at the Conservatorio Santa Cecilia, followed by a master's degree at Basel Music Academy. In 2006 she moved to Berlin to study orchestral conducting at the Hanns Eisler Hochschule. In 2017 she was a semi-finalist at the Georg Solti Conducting Competition in Frankfurt. As an assistant conductor she has worked at the Staatsoper Berlin, Bavarian State Opera, Deutsche Oper Berlin and Salzburg Festival.