When the Leipzig Gewandhaus and Boston Symphony Orchestras performed Shostakovich’s complete works together in 2025, the only conductor invited to share duties with Andris Nelsons was Anna Rakitina. Here, this extremely significant emerging conductor leads the talented young players of the Bergen Philharmonic Youth Orchestra in a performance of Shostakovich’s gripping symphony of defiance and survival – music, that for the Russian-born Rakitina, runs deep.

If you want to know why Anna Clyne is one of the most performed composers alive, come and hear her stirring, pulsing and seething orchestral seascape Restless Oceans. It opens this concert before Christian Tetzlaff, a violinist of supreme integrity and character, brings us his own distinctive take on Tchaikovsky’s spirited Violin Concerto. Be prepared for Tetzlaff to reveal new ideas, emotions and meanings in a work too often dismissed as a vehicle for virtuosity alone.