John Storgårds launches his inaugural season as musical director of Canada’s National Arts Centre Orchestra with focus on Jean Coulthard

John Storgårds & Canada’s National Arts Centre Orchestra [Photo: Curtis Perry]

John Storgårds launches a new chapter when he conducts his inaugural concerts as music director with Canada’s National Arts Centre (NAC) Orchestra in Ottawa on 4 and 5 November 2026. Storgårds made his debut with the orchestra in 2013 and was principal guest conductor from 2015 to 2026. He succeeds Alexander Shelley, who led the ensemble for 11 seasons [see my 2023 interview with Alexander Shelly]. In the UK, Storgårds is best known as the chief conductor of the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra 

For the inaugural concerts, Storgårds conducts Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 with soloist Élisabeth Pion (Gold Laureate of the 2025 Honens International Piano Competition), Charles Ives’s The Unanswered Question, Antonín Dvořák’s Symphony No. 3, and Jean Coulthard’s Symphonic image: Vision of the North.

The presence of Coulthard’s work reflects the way Storgårds’ first season has a strong focus on Canadian voices, highlighting rising stars, celebrated performers, and some of the country’s most influential composers. 

A particular focus of the season is the music of Jean Coulthard (1908–2000), one of Canada’s most significant composers. Thanks to a scholarship she studied at the Royal College of Music in 1928-1929 where she was a pupil of Kathleen Long, R.O. Morris, and Ralph Vaughan Williams. She went on to study with Béla Bartók, Aaron Copland, and Arnold Schoenberg and worked with Bernard Wagenaar of the Juilliard School, New York. In 1948, she met the British composer Elizabeth Poston (who was visiting Canada) and they began a long friendship and an extensive correspondence over the next 30 years.

Her work appears across three of the NAC Orchestra’s orchestral programs and a chamber concert. In January 2027, Storgårds will lead the NAC Orchestra in Coulthard’s Symphony No. 1, a work not performed in full since its 1950s premiere. He will also devote his first recording project with the Orchestra to Coulthard’s music, bringing renewed attention to her remarkable artistic legacy.

Further information from the Orchestra’s website.