Originally founded as the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra, the Grammy Award-winning Minnesota Orchestra ranks among America’s top symphonic ensembles. Currently led by Music Director Osmo Vänskä, the Orchestra has a distinguished history of acclaimed performances and a visionary commitment to building the orchestral repertoire of tomorrow.

Now in its second century, the Minnesota Orchestra gave its inaugural performance on November 5, 1903, shortly after the first ever World Series in the history of Baseball and six weeks before the Wright brothers made their unprecedented airplane flight, creating the first ever successful airplane. The Orchestra played its first regional tour in 1907 and made its New York City debut in 1912 at Carnegie Hall, where it has performed regularly ever since. Along with regular appearances at the iconic Carnegie Hall, the orchestra have also undertaken international tours which have taken them to London for the BBC Proms, Australia, Canada, Europe, the Far East, Latin America and the Middle East. 

In August 2018 the ensemble made history as the first professional U.S. orchestra ever to visit South Africa, in a five-city tour from Cape Town to Soweto — the culmination of a month-long Music for Mandela celebration of Nelson Mandela’s centennial. The orchestra also performed two historic concerts in Havana, Cuba, where it became the first major American orchestra to perform in the island nation since the U.S. and Cuban governments announced steps to normalize relations between the two countries. The trip drew widespread international attention and prompted The New York Times to hail the Orchestra’s new place ​“at the cultural vanguard.”