China National Symphony Orchestra

Li Delun conducted the first concert in commemoration of the 200th anniversary of the birth of Mozart in Beijing after the founding of CPOC. On October 1, 1959, the concert of Beethoven No.9 was performed by the orchestra in Beijing, and all the musicians were Chinese. In 1996, the Central Philharmonic was restructured and renamed the CNSO.

The Beijing Concert Hall was founded as the Center Cinema in 1927. It was rebuilt for the CNSO in 1960 on the Beixinhuajie in Xicheng District which is one the south of Liubukou.

Currently, Xia Guan, a famous Composer, is the executive head of the CNSO.

The current conductors of CNSO include the French conductor Michel Plasson who was nominated as the Principal Conductor of the CNSO in March 2010. Tang Muhai is the laureate conductor. Xincao Li is the principal resident conductor, Shao En is the principal guest conductor, Xieyang Chen is the guest conductor, and Yunzhi Liu is the concertmaster.

The first principal conductor and artistic director Zuohuang Chen came back from USA and built the CNSO based on the original CPOC. During Chen's tenure during 1996 and 2000, CNSO was believed the best orchestra in China at that time. However, Chen did not accept the contract renewal in 2000 even though CNSO hoped he could continue. The famous conductor Muhai Tang took over the artistic director but left the position one year later without formal resignation due to the conflicts with the executive Songlin Yu. There was no principal conductor or artistic director in CNSO until En Shao took the position in 2006. Shao was in the position for one season only and served as guest conductor afterwards. Finally in 2010, CNSO the 4th principal conductor Michel Plasson started to lead CNSO but he has not been with the title artistic director. Wikipedia