"Mäkelä and the players fed off each other’s energy to produce a performance that one hopes was as breathtaking for them to play as it was for the audience to hear … The shattering end of the Rite brought the audience instantly to its feet - in recognition, one hoped, as much of musical history brought to life as of the achievement of these immensely accomplished visitors from {…}

" A dazzling concert presenting the 3 great ballets of 1909-1913 by Igor Stravinsky, Firebird, Petrushka and The Rite of Spring, a dream I'd always had of hearing all three in the same concert, and with the quality of performance offered this evening ... gorging myself on the constantly renewed hectic rhythms, the fabulous gleam of the timbres, the impressive instrumental velocity, the {…}

The Oslo Philharmonic's stripped-down opera performance let the music speak for itself … With text and music, Bartok creates clear images in the mind of the listener … It's powerful. We don't need more ... That it worked this way (in concert) was thanks to chief conductor Klaus Mäkelä's sense of suspense. He kept the orchestra in a quivering limbo much of the time, as if they {…}

"Only the greats can have so much 'new' and unique things to say about such a flatly played piece (as Mussorgsky's Pictures from an Exhibition). In every part, Mäkelä managed to reveal unsuspected details, with the brilliant orchestra always as his excellent instrument. And when we arrived in amazement at The Great Gate of Kiev, the orchestral floodgates opened at exactly the right {…}

"In the miniature overture and first act (of the Nutcracker), the Orchestre de Paris and its musical director were magnificent. For Mäkelä is an outstanding rhythmicist who always keeps the pulse even in the freest rubato, letting a magnificent orchestra perform while being there at strategic moments, giving this delightful, refined music, as tragic at times as one of the composer's {…}