Kirill Petrenko has been elected as the new chief conductor and artistic director for the Berlin Philharmonic. He succeeds Sir Simon Rattle, who will leave the orchestra in August 2018. The Russian conductor was elected by a large majority of the members of the orchestra during an assembly yesterday. Petrenko is currently general music director at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich. The Berlin Philharmonic, founded in 1882, has had three chief conductors over the past six decades; they were Herbert von Karajan, Claudio Abbado, and Sir Simon Rattle.
