In the summer of 1945, an of?cer of the British Army of Occupation and conductor Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt went in search of musicians to play in a newly formed orchestra. Several months later, this ensemble gave its ?rst public concert and the NDR SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA was born. Under its Chief Conductors – Hans Schmidt-Isserstedt, Moshe Atzmon, Klaus Tennstedt, Günter Wand, John Eliot Gardiner, Herbert Blomstedt, and, currently, Christoph Eschenbach – the Orchestra has dedicated itself intensively to cultivating the great Classical and Romantic works while at the same time making a name for itself as an interpreter of contemporary music. The NDR Symphony has performed world premieres of works by Bussotti, Henze, Lachenmann, Ligeti, Nono, Penderecki, Schoenberg, Stravinsky, and Zimmermann. Christoph Eschenbach, who had a long prior history of successful cooperation with the orchestra, became Chief Conductor of the NDR Symphony at the start of the 1998/99 season.