Eleven months into the LSO’s Panufnik Scheme for composers, Joel Järventausta tells us about how he tackled the challenge of writing music for a full-size Symphony Orchestra and the poetic inspiration for his piece, Suns Extinguished

After a thrilling final, the Donatella Flick LSO Conducting Competition 2018 came to a close on 22 November and Felix Mildenberger was crowned its winner and LSO Assistant Conductor for the next two years.

Ahead of his performance with the LSO on Thursday 29 November, we talked to conductor Kristjan Järvi about what Bach, Handel, Radiohead and minimalism all have in common – as well as his philosophy for childlike musical discovery.

In 2016, Niklas Benjamin Hoffman became the winner of the Donatella Flick Conducting Competition, after conducting the LSO in the Competition's final concert at the Barbican. Since then he has worked with the Orchestra as Assistant Conductor while establishing a diverse freelance career. We talked to Niklas about what happens over the three days of the Competition and what his advice is to the conductors who’ll be stepping onto the podium in 2018.