Nils Schweckendiek

Nils Schweckendiek studied music at Clare College, Cambridge, and orchestral and choral conducting in Freiburg and Helsinki. Since making his highly successful debut at the Finnish National Opera with Richard Strauss’ Der Rosenkavalier in 2006, he has performed with orchestras, ensembles and choirs in many European countries, the United States and China, and appeared at numerous opera houses and festivals, including the Leipzig Opera and Savonlinna Opera Festival.

Nils Schweckendiek is committed to performing the music of our time and has conducted around 100 first performances, including music theatre, orchestral, choral and ensemble works. He has made a number of critically acclaimed CDs for the BIS, Toccata Classics, Alba and ICSM labels, winning several awards.

Since 2007 Nils Schweckendiek has been Artistic Director of the Helsinki Chamber Choir. In 2014 he was appointed Professor of Choral Conducting at the Sibelius Academy of the University of the Arts Helsinki, and from 2017 he has been Artistic Director of the Chorus of the Helsinki Music Centre.

Recent guest conducting has included the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra, Finnish Radio Symphony Orchestra, Crash Ensemble, Oulu Sinfonia, Seinäjoki Orchestra, RIAS Kammerchor, Chamber Choir Ireland, the Croatian Radio and TV Choir, Coro Casa da música in Porto and the North German Radio Choir in Hamburg. In 2020 the Society for Swedish Literature in Finland awarded him the Fredrik Pacius Prize for his services to Finnish music.