James S. Kahane is the Music Director of the Hamilton Philharmonic Orchestra, Principal Conductor of the Helsinki Chamber Orchestra and Principal Conductor of the Orchestre de Chambre de la Drôme. Commended for his ability to “weave the musical phrases together with flexibility and determination, as well as the musicians between them.” (Bachtrack) and to “take the orchestra to its extremes” (Keskisuomalainen), Kahane has conducted first-rate orchestras around the world such as the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra or the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra. His debut album with the Helsinki Chamber Orchestra, released by Resonus Classics, has been lauded as a “colossal album that will inspire for generations to come” (The Flute View).

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​With a wealth of experience in both the symphonic and operatic worlds, Kahane conducted productions of operas such as Bizet’s The Tragedy of Carmen, Britten’s The Rape of Lucretia and Kokkonen’s The Last Temptaions among others, as well as world premiered of operas such as Kon’s Bas Sheve or Tuurna’s Years of Silence. He has been a regular guest conductor at the Finnish Chamber Opera and was also a conductor at the Helsinki Contemporary Opera Festival on several occasions. During the Spring 2024, Kahane was the Assistant Conductor to Hannu Lintu at the Bayerische Staatsoper for their production of Pelléas et Mélisande by Debussy, for which he was glowingly and publicly credited by Lintu.

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Recent years have seen Kahane guest conducting internationally, appearing with orchestras such as the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra, the Orchestre National de Mulhouse, the Miroirs Étendus Ensemble, the Jyväskylä Sinfonia, the St. Michel Strings and the Pori Sinfonietta. He was Susanna Mälkki’s Assistant Conductor at the Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra for their 2017/2018 season, where he worked at her side and with the orchestra’s guest conductors, aged only 21 at the time. In 2018, Kristjan Järvi invited him to conduct the Baltic Academies Orchestra in Berlin for their first international tour, and the following year, Kahane was offered a conducting fellowship at the Atlantic Music Festival in the United States, where he worked during the summer of 2019.