Conductor Robin Ticciati is to Leave the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin

The 40-year-old British conductor has elected to step down in the summer of 2025 — two years before his contract comes to a close

British-Italian conductor Robin Ticciati has served as the Chief Conductor at the Deutsches Symphonie-Orchester Berlin (DSO) since 2017, and in 2020 signed a seven-year contract extension. Recently, he announced that he will stay only until the summer of 2025. A reason for the early departure has not been given as this time.

Ticciati's time with the DSO has been an innovative one: he prompted the orchestra to experiment with playing Baroque works on gut strings, and has also championed new music, introducing free improvisation into the orchestra's work.

Ticciati is presently also the Music Director of Glyndebourne Festival Opera, a role he accepted in 2014. He was the Principal Conductor of the Scottish Chamber Orchestra from 2009 to 2018.

Alongside these positions, Ticciati is in demand as a guest conductor and has made appearances with the London Philharmonic Orchestra, London Symphony Orchestra, Wiener Philharmoniker, and the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, among others.

Born in London into an Italian family, Ticciati studied the violin, the piano, and percussion. He began conducting in his teens and has been mentored by both Sir Colin Davis and Sir Simon Rattle.

Other previous conductors of the DSO include Kent Nagano, Ingo Metzmacher, and Tugan Sokhiev — though Ticciati's tenure has been longer and more stable than any of them.

"As chief conductor, I am a gardener who makes sure that the musicians can grow artistically," Ticciati said of his role in 2020. "It's not my orchestra, it's theirs."