Christmas matinee
In 1975, Bernard Haitink conducted the Concertgebouw Orchestra's very first Christmas Matinee. Since then, the Concertgebouw Orchestra's Christmas concert has been broadcast live from the Main Hall on television every Christmas Day – previously by Eurovision, and for many years now by AVROTROS.
Klaus Mäkelä
The Christmas Matinee is traditionally the domain of the chief conductor, and in the final years of the future chief conductor, Klaus Mäkelä. On Christmas Day 2025, he will lead a solemn concert full of twilight hues, nocturnal whispers, and stories from distant lands. Experience the fairy tales of the One Thousand and One Nights in Rimsky-Korsakov's sultry Scheherazade , with the solo violin as the central theme. Much less well-known, but equally captivating, is the symphonic poem Lydian Night by Alphons Diepenbrock, considered the Netherlands' most important composer of the late Romantic period. Empathize with a shepherd who is completely alone in the darkness, with his turbulent inner life and the cool, distant moon...
