Orchestra Della Svizzera Italiana

Resident orchestra of the LAC Lugano Arte e Cultura (Ticino, Switzerland), the Orchestra della Svizzera Italiana (OSI) continues its successful trajectory, enjoying critical and popular acclaim in major theaters and concert halls throughout Europe. Since 2022, its principal guest conductor has been Krzysztof Urbański, who succeeded Vladimir Ashkenazy.

It headlines three series in Lugano: OSI al LAC, from autumn to spring; OSI in Auditorium; and OSI a Pentecoste, created to establish a regular performance schedule for the OSI on a weekend of particular significance for international audiences.

This is complemented by special events to reach new audiences, including concerts for some 10,000 children a year within the context of cultural mediation. It collaborates with internationally renowned conductors and soloists: among them Martha Argerich, with whom the OSI has maintained a privileged relationship for more than twenty years, and Sol Gabetta, with whom it has developed a stable collaboration that has led to the creation of the triennial Presenza al LAC festival, which will return to Lugano in 2027. It maintains an intense recording activity, in collaboration with Swiss Italian-language broadcaster RSI: the OSI and Markus Poschner – principal conductor until 2025 – won two prestigious ICMA awards: in 2018 for the complete Brahms Symphonies (SONY Classical) and in 2025 for a CD of Hindemith and Schnittke (ECM New Series). Also worth mentioning is a series of CDs dedicated to previously unpublished works by Rossini and Tchaikovsky's Symphonies Nos. 5 and 6. Opera and ballet co-productions, open-air concerts, and summer festivals round out the program, which attracts an ever-growing audience.