22
May
Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla
In 2016, Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla was appointed Music Director of the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, succeeding conductors such as Sir Simon Rattle and Andris Nelsons. She led the orchestra in numerous concerts and international tours, shaped distinctive programmes and sharpened the ensemble’s artistic profile. At the end of the 2021/22 season, she stepped down as Music Director and has since remained connected to the orchestra as Associate Artist.
Among her most recent highlights are the critically acclaimed new productions of Mieczysław Weinberg’s The Passenger at Teatro Real Madrid and The Idiot at the Salzburg Festival, as well as debuts with the New York Philharmonic, the Sächsische Staatskapelle Dresden and the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig, alongside guest appearances with the Munich Philharmonic, the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France and the Philadelphia Orchestra. In spring 2025, she made her debut with the Vienna Philharmonic — making history as the first woman to conduct the orchestra in a subscription concert.
In the 2025/26 season, long-awaited debuts include the Berliner Philharmoniker, the Oslo Philharmonic, the Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra, the Orchestre de la Suisse Romande and the Orquesta Nacional de España. She also returns to the Orchestre Philharmonique de Radio France, the Gewandhausorchester Leipzig and the New York Philharmonic.
Raised in a family of musicians in Vilnius, Lithuania, Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla first studied choral and orchestral conducting at the University of Music and Performing Arts Graz. She then continued her studies at the Conservatorio di Musica in Bologna, the Leipzig University of Music and Theatre and the Zurich University of the Arts. From 2011 to 2014, she served as Kapellmeister at Theater und Orchester Heidelberg and Konzert Theater Bern, before moving to the Salzburg Landestheater, where she was Music Director from 2015 to 2017.
In spring 2019, Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla’s debut CD for Deutsche Grammophon was released, devoted to the music of Mieczysław Weinberg. The recording, made with the City of Birmingham Symphony Orchestra, Kremerata Baltica and Gidon Kremer, received both the Opus Klassik and the Gramophone Award in 2020. As an exclusive Deutsche Grammophon artist, she subsequently released a portrait album of the Lithuanian composer Raminta Šerkšnytė, The British Project with works by Britten, Elgar, Walton and Vaughan Williams, as well as further albums from her acclaimed Weinberg cycle. Her new album Back to Nature, featuring works by Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis and her father Romualdas Gražinis, was released in September 2025.
