Orchestra Tours Japan and South Korea in October
The Japan leg of the tour begins on 9 October at Takasaki Arts Theatre, after which the orchestra will perform in Osaka, Kawaguchi, Tokyo, Hamamatsu, Ueda and Yokohama. In Tokyo, the concerts will take place at two of the country’s most prestigious venues, Suntory Hall and Tokyo Opera City.
Founded in 1882, the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra has an especially close connection to Jean Sibelius. The orchestra premiered most of the composer’s orchestral works under Sibelius’s own baton, and his music features prominently throughout the tour programme. The newly released complete recording of the Sibelius symphonies, Sibelius & Saraste: The 7 Symphonies, conducted by Chief Conductor Jukka-Pekka Saraste, has received an exceptionally enthusiastic reception in Japan. Released by the record label Ondine, the symphony cycle rose to the top of Japan’s classical music charts already during the pre-order period, and the recording has been widely praised in the Japanese media.
At most of the concerts in Japan, the orchestra will be joined by the highly acclaimed Japanese pianist Hayato Sumino as soloist. The programme features Sergei Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto No. 3, Jean Sibelius’s Symphony No. 2, and excerpts from the incidental music Pelléas et Mélisande. The programme was performed twice to sold-out audiences at Helsinki Music Centre at the turn of the month. “Rarely do an orchestra and a soloist speak so completely the same musical language,” wrote Helsingin Sanomat in its review of the concert on 1 October 2026.
One of the Tokyo concerts will also feature Sibelius’s Violin Concerto with Ryota Higashi as soloist.
Following Japan, the orchestra will travel to South Korea, where it will perform in Daegu, Daejeon and Seoul on 20–22 October. The soloist for the South Korean concerts will be Korean violinist Inmo Yang, familiar to Finnish audiences as the winner of the International Jean Sibelius Violin Competition held in Helsinki in 2022.
The Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra serves as an ambassador for Finnish culture and for the City of Helsinki, and the tour coincides with significant business networking and cultural exchange events in both Japan and South Korea.
“We are particularly proud to present the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra at this moment in our history, as we approach the orchestra’s 150th anniversary,” says the orchestra’s Managing Director Jari Eskola.
Tour arrangements are managed by Maestro Arts.
Tour programme can be found here.
Soloists