New Principal Guest Director for Canada’s Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra

Violinist Rachel Podger has been appointed to the new position for two years, effective as of September 2024

From September 2024 until the end of the 2025/26 season, British violinist Rachel Podger will serve the newly created role of principal guest director of the Toronto-based Tafelmusik Baroque Orchestra and Chamber Choir.

Podger will direct three mainstage programs each season, a series of recordings, and select tours, including Tafelmusik’s 2024 Asia Tour. She will work closely with Tafelmusik’s artistic co-directors — violist Brandon Chui, bassoonist Dominic Teresi, and violinist Cristina Zacharias.

An established interpreter of baroque and classical music, Podger was the first woman to be awarded the 2015 Royal Academy of Music/Kohn Foundation Bach Prize, Gramophone Artist of the Year in 2018, and the Ambassador for REMA’s Early Music Day in 2020. 

She is the founder and artistic director of the Brecon Baroque Festival, artist in focus at Kings Place, a patron for The Continuo Foundation, and an Ambassador for the Learned Society of Wales. Additionally, she has won the 2023 BBC Music Magazine Recording of the Year and Instrumental Award winner for her solo album “Tutta Sola.”

Alongside a residency at London’s Wigmore Hall, she has appeared with the BBC Philharmonic, Royal Northern Sinfonia, Montana Baroque, Tesserae Baroque, and Philharmonia Baroque. 

As an educator, she is the chair for baroque violin at the Royal Academy of Music and the Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama. She also teaches regularly at New York’s Juilliard School.

Her upcoming engagements include performing with Salamanca Baroque, Luthers Bach Ensemble, Handel and Haydn Society, and in recordings, including CPE Bach, a box set of Vivaldi, and The Goldberg Variations Re-imagined.

“La Passione: Haydn & Mozart, my recent project with Tafelmusik, felt like a homecoming — exciting yet easy, a shared musical language and a collective fount of creativity and passionate aspiration amongst a team of friends,” said Podger. 

“To then learn that I had been gifted the opportunity of a closer relationship with an ensemble I have admired for so many years is a dream come true,” she continued. “I can’t wait to return and share new musical adventures with the ensemble and its dedicated family of followers.”

“Rachel Podger’s well-deserved reputation as one of the world’s top baroque violinists presents a wonderful opportunity for Tafelmusik to amplify its standing as a global leader in period performance,” said Tafelmusik’s interim executive director, Daniela Nardi. “In addition to Rachel’s superb musicianship and gift for creative collaboration, she has an innate ability to communicate with audiences in a compelling way. We look forward to a thrilling new chapter at Tafelmusik with Rachel on board.”   

“We are thrilled to welcome renowned violinist Rachel Podger,” added Zacharias. “Our recent concerts with her were electrifying, sensitive, and virtuosic, and created magical experiences for musicians and audiences alike. Rachel is a generous and inspiring artist and we cannot wait to collaborate more regularly with her!”

A video of Podger’s recent project with Tafelmusik can be viewed below. 

Founded in the 1970s, Tafelmusik focuses on historically informed performance with concerts featuring period instruments. Performing around 80 concerts a year and reaching millions of people across its recordings, media, broadcasts, and partnerships, it is Canada’s most-toured orchestra — having appeared in over 350 cities in 32 countries.