Music for a Sunday Afternoon

Principal Guest Conductor of the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra as well as the NAC Orchestra, John Storgårds has a dual career as a conductor and violin virtuoso and is widely recognized for his creative flair for programming. He additionally holds the title of Artistic Director of the Lapland Chamber Orchestra.

Highlights of his 2018–2019 season include his subscription debut with the Boston Symphony, and debut appearances with the Munich Philharmonic and Seoul Philharmonic. He returns to the BBC Proms with the BBC Philharmonic and goes on tour with the Radio Symphony Orchestra Berlin. Storgårds visited the NAC last October for concerts with violinist Christian Tetzlaff, and returns to play this Music for a Sunday Afternoon concert and lead the Orchestra in performances with Yefim Bronfman.

Equally at home in the opera house, he gave the world premiere of Sebastian Fagerlund’s new opera Höstsonaten (Autumn Sonata) at the Finnish National Opera in 2017. John Storgårds’ award-winning discography includes recordings of not only works by Schumann, Mozart, Beethoven and Haydn, but also rarities by Holmboe and Vask, which feature him as violin soloist. 

Read full NAC bio ›

A virtuoso with a warm, elegant style and a wide-ranging repertoire, pianist David Jalbert has established himself among the elite of a new generation of classical musicians. Named by the CBC as among the 15 best Canadian pianists of all time, he performs regularly as a soloist and recitalist in Canada and across the globe. His solo recordings – of the Goldberg Variations, the Shostakovich Preludes and Fugues, and of American, French and Russian music – have all garnered international praise in the media, from Gramophone to France‑Culture. 

An accomplished chamber musician, Jalbert is a member of Triple Forte along with violinist Jasper Wood and cellist Denise Djokic, and is a regular guest in the NAC’s Music for a Sunday Afternoon concert series. As a soloist, he has collaborated with conductors such as Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Skitch Henderson and Bramwell Tovey.

David Jalbert has won five Prix Opus, and was the 2007 laureate of the prestigious Virginia Parker Prize of the Canada Council for the Arts. He holds diplomas from The Juilliard School and the Glenn Gould School, and is now Associate Professor of Piano at the University of Ottawa.