The Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra (HK Phil) is regarded as one of the leading orchestras in Asia. Presenting more than 150 concerts over a 44-week season, the HK Phil attracts more than 200,000 music lovers annually. The HK Phil won the prestigious UK classical music magazine Gramophone’s 2019 Orchestra of the Year Award – the first orchestra in Asia to receive this accolade.

​​Tarmo Peltokoski is the HK Phil’s Music Director Designate in 2025/26 and will become Music Director in the 2026/27 season. ​Currently, Long Yu serves as Principal Guest Conductor and Lio Kuokman is Resident Conductor.​ Esa-Pekka Salonen is Composer-in-Residence.​

The HK Phil has flourished in the last two decades under Jaap van Zweden (Music Director, 2012–2024) and Edo de Waart (Artistic Director and Chief Conductor, 2004–2012). The orchestra successfully completed a four-year journey through Wagner’s Ring Cycle, performing and recording one opera from the cycle annually from 2015 to 2018. The concert performances were well received, and the live Naxos recordings were praised by critics, and garnered the Gramophone Orchestra of the Year Award 2019. Other recent recording projects include Mahler’s Symphony no. 10, Shostakovich’s Symphony no. 10, and Tchaikovsky’s Symphony no. 6 and Piano Concerto no. 1.​ The HK Phil collaborates with Deutsche Grammophon and releases Wagner’s The Ring: An Orchestral Adventure, arranged by Henk de Vlieger and conducted by Tarmo Peltokoski.

The HK Phil has toured extensively across the Chinese Mainland. The orchestra undertook a major tour in 2017 to Seoul, Osaka, Singapore, Melbourne and Sydney in celebration of the 20th anniversary of the establishment of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region. The HK Phil ​toured Europe, Asia and the Chinese Mainland, performing in 22 cities across ten countries in​ its 50th anniversary.​

Conductors and soloists who have recently performed with the orchestra include Stéphane Denève, Christoph Eschenbach, Daniel Gatti, Daniel Harding, Pietari Inkinen, Paavo Järvi, Andrés Orozco-Estrada, Vasily Petrenko, Emanuel Ax, Joshua Bell, Ning Feng, Mao Fujita, Jonas Kaufmann, Lang Lang, Leonidas Kavakos, Olivier Latry, Yo-Yo Ma, Anne-Sophie Mutter, Aristo Sham, and Akiko Suwanai. The HK Phil promotes the work of Hong Kong and Chinese composers through an active commissioning programme, and it has released recordings on the Naxos label featuring Tan Dun and Bright Sheng, each conducting their own compositions.