���غ���

The ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra is one of four major orchestral ensembles based in Vienna, the others being the Vienna Philharmonic, Vienna State Opera Orchestra, and Vienna Symphony Orchestra. The ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra, or ORF Radio-Symphonieorchester Wien, is unique because it is the only radio symphony orchestra in Austria and is thus the official Austrian broadcast orchestra. Its repertory has been broad, taking in pre-Classical, Classical, Romantic, and 20th century music, with a substantial portion devoted to contemporary works.

The Vienna RSO was formed in 1969, from the ORF Symphony Orchestra, a postwar ensemble largely devoted to contemporary music. The new ensemble retained the name of the parent orchestra, and its management appointed the first chief conductor, Milan Horvat (1969-1975), who largely retained the policy of promoting the music of contemporary Austrian composers and works by Schoenberg, Berg, and Webern. With the ascension of Leif Segerstam as chief conductor in 1975, the Vienna RSO, while retaining a strong allegiance to 20th century music, began to focus attention on Classical and Romantic works as well. This tendency was expanded further when Lothar Zagrosek (1982-1986) succeeded Segerstam. Zagrosek often played rarely encountered Classical works. Pinchas Steinberg served as chief conductor from 1989-1996. It was in the latter year that the ensemble adopted the name Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra. More importantly, the management also appointed Dennis Russell Davies as the new chief conductor. Davies made numerous recordings with the orchestra, almost all focusing on modern or contemporary works by the likes of Berio, Glass, Kancheli, Silvestrov, and Tüür. Bertrand de Billy succeeded Davies in 2002. He was even more active in the recording studio, with well over 20 recordings to his credit, recordings that covered broader repertory, including many standards by Haydn, Beethoven, Dvorák, Debussy, and more. Toward the end of his tenure, de Billy had disputes with orchestra management that led to his decision to step down. In 2009, the orchestra was renamed to its current name, ORF Vienna Radio Symphony Orchestra. That same year, management announced that Cornelius Meister would succeed de Billy in 2010; Meister remained in this post until 2018. In 2019, Marin Alsop assumed the orchestra's chief conductor position, becoming the first woman to hold the post.

The Vienna RSO performs at one of four Viennese locales: the Musikverein, Wiener Konzerthaus, ORF RadioKulturhaus, and the Theater an der Wien. The ensemble receives government funding and is regarded as a cultural goodwill ambassador for Austria. The orchestra gives regular tours abroad; previous trips have taken them throughout Europe, the Americas, China, and Japan. It has recorded for such labels as CPO, Sony Classical, Orfeo, and Oehms Classics, among many others. In 2020, the Vienna RSO was heard on the Capriccio album Ernst von Dohnányi: The Veil of Pierrette, under Ariane Matiakh, and the Naxos album, Morton Gould: Symphonettes Nos. 2-4; Spirituals for Orchestra, under Arthur Fagen. ~ Robert Cummings

Leif Segerstam was primarily known as a conductor, generally ranked among the most prominent from Finland in the latter 20th and early 21st centuries. He was also a composer with a massive output, making the cataloging of his music difficult. His 80th birthday in 2024 saw the premiere of his 371st symphony. Yet that apparently enormous body of music was not quite what it seemed since he typically wrote the same piece in different scorings using aleatoric methods involving less complex and less specific notation. Still, his output contained countless orchestral and choral works, concertos, songs, string quartets, and instrumental pieces. In 2020, Segerstam led the Turku Philharmonic in a recording of Mahler's Symphony No. 4 on the Alba label.

Segerstam was born in Vaasa, Finland, on March 2, 1944. He entered the Sibelius Academy of Music in Helsinki in his mid-teens, where he studied violin with Liisa Siikonen and conducting with Jussi Jalas. Segerstam was also an excellent pianist then and won first prize in the 1962 Maj Lind Piano Competition held by the Sibelius Academy. The following year, he graduated with degrees in both violin and conducting and gave his first major concert as a violinist. By then, he had already written his earliest compositions, which included the brief 1960 orchestral work A Legend (Nils-Eric Fougstedt in Memoriam) and Three Songs for soprano and piano (1960-1961). Following his graduation, he enrolled at the Juilliard School of Music, where he studied violin with Louis Persinger, conducting with Jean Morel, and composition with Vincent Persichetti and Hall Overton.

In 1965, Segerstam received his first important conducting appointment to the Finnish National Opera as director for the 1973-1974 season. Segerstam held two other conducting posts at opera houses in Scandinavia and Germany, at the Royal Opera in Stockholm from 1968 to 1972, and at the Deutsche Oper in Berlin for a single season (1972-1973). Segerstam turned out many compositions during these early conducting years, including several string quartets (the Fifth, subtitled "Lemming," was a stylistically pivotal work in his use of aleatory methods) and the song collection Tre plus eller fyra NNNUUUU-R, for mezzo-soprano and piano, on texts by Gunnar Björling.

Segerstam successively took three conducting posts with second-tier European orchestras in the period from 1977 to 1985 (the Austrian Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, and the Rheinland-Pfalz State Philharmonic Orchestra). He was appointed chief conductor of the Danish National Radio Symphony Orchestra in 1989. For the labels BIS, Ondine, and Finlandia, he turned out performances of his symphonies No. 9, No. 11, and No. 13, among many others, and violin concertos, Concerto Serioso and A Last Melodioso, with his then-wife Hannele Segerstam as soloist. Upon his departure from the Danish National Radio Symphony in 1995, he accepted the position of chief conductor for the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra and returned to Stockholm's Royal Opera once more as music director.

Segerstam remained with the Royal Opera until 2000 and stepped down from his post with the Helsinki Philharmonic in 2007, taking the title of chief conductor emeritus. At the Royal Opera House, Segerstam conducted a wide range of works. In 2002, for example, he led performances of Wagner's Tristan und Isolde, Prokofiev's The Fiery Angel, and Janácek's The Makropulos Affair. The orchestras he guest conducted included the Chicago Symphony, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, and the Turku Philharmonic. Segerstam led the latter group in a recording of Mahler's Symphony No. 4 on the Alba label in 2020. Segerstam continued to conduct and compose into the 2020s, penning no fewer than five symphonies in 2021; his Symphony No. 371 was premiered at the composer's 80 birthday celebration in March 2024. Segerstam died on October 9, 2024. ~ Robert Cummings & Keith Finke