Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra Names New Music Director and Principal Conductor

Polish conductor Grzegorz Nowak will step into the role

The Polish conductor Grzegorz Nowak has been appointed to the role of Music Director and Principal Conductor at the Philippine Philharmonic Orchestra (PPO). He succeeds Yoshikazu Fukumara, who resigned in 2021, and the position has remained open since.

Over the course of the PPO's 38th season, five shortlisted conductors made appearances with the orchestra so that the search committee could make as informed a decision as possible. Nowak led a concert in October 2022, featuring works by Lucio San Pedro, Mendelssohn, Tchaikovsky, and Stravinsky, and emerged victorious as the winner of the position.

Nowak's conducting career first began when he won the Ernest Ansermet Conducting Competition in Geneva. Around the same time he was named European Musician of the Year — by a committee chaired by Pierre Boulez.

He has worked with a number of celebrated orchestras, including the London Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre National de France, and the Hong Kong Philharmonic, and was the Music Director of the Polish National Opera between 2017 and 2020.

Nowak has been most closely associated with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, where he served as the Associate Conductor from 2015 — having been named Principal Associate Conductor in 2008.

He studied conducting, composition, and violin at the Ignacy Jan Paderewski Academy of Music in Poznań, Poland, and received his doctorate from the Eastman School of Music.