With a classical release, is there any guidance as to the order that performer artists credits should be listed?
For example, there are some releases where the artist credits are
Mahler; Valery Gergiev, London Symphony Orchestra
with others (in the same series of releases so similar artist credits on the artwork)
Mahler; London Symohony Orchestra, Valery Gergiev.
The cover art lists Gergiev above (more prominently than) LSO, but have I missed a reason why they are listed in reverse in some cases?
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Usually I just do most prominent names if there are any and then top → bottom, left → right. But I’m unsure.
Brandenburg Concertos nos. 2, 3, 5 / Suite no. 3 Johann Sebastian Bach; Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra, Herbert von Karajan is one of the guideline examples, but I would put Karajan first.
https://musicbrainz.org/doc/Style/Classical/Release_Artist
I’d put Karajan first too.
Classical is ruled by many (unwritten) conventions and traditions. For Recordings I systematically use: „Soloist(s), (choir and) orchestra, conductor“. This is the order also used by the script „replace Recording Artists from Recording AR“.
For Release Artist I usually expect (and go for) the same order, unless this seems really wrong for some reason. Discogs uses (with very rare exceptions) the same order, also in the Karajan Edition Release linked above https://www.discogs.com/release/13447625-Johann-Sebastian-Bach-Berliner-Philharmoniker-Karajan-Brandenburgische-Konzerte-Nr235-OuvertĂĽre-Sui?redirected=true
So I would stay here also with the conventional order, as seen on back cover and medium: “orchestra, conductor”
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See thats the thing… I would say the unwritten rule with conductor and orchestra is that conductor is more important (comes first) than orchestra.
I think probably the more important thing is consistency? So in the particuar example of Gergiev / LSO here – Release group “Symphonies nos. 1-9” by Mahler; Valery Gergiev, London Symphony Orchestra - MusicBrainz — I’ll go through and change all the release artists to be consistent with cover are (Gergiev before LSO)
The more important thing of all is that the relationships are there and are good 
I generally also do soloists, orchestra, conductor, but I won’t cry if someone changes some for consistency.
Just noting that another example from the guidelines has the soloist last. By cover it would be Copland, London Symphony Orchestra, William Warfield, Columbia Symphony Orchestra. So, it follows none of the two suggested styles put forward in this thread.
Copland Conducts Copland Copland; London Symphony Orchestra, Columbia Symphony Orchestra, Copland, William Warfield
The rationale for this may be that the soloist, other than the orchestra and the conductor, performs only on a few of the tracks. Despite the prominent place the conductor takes on the cover art it’s still orchestra before conductor.
Front cover art often follows marketing issues – putting forward the most notable, best selling Artist(s). See the Karajan example above: Karajan is prominently shown on the front cover, but on back cover and medium it’s the conventional order: orchestra, conductor
Warfield performs on the same amount of tracks as Columbia Symphony Orchestra, though, yet he’s listed at the end. We’re already following the marketing on the cover (or spine) for the artists that are credited[1], not back cover. Since no set order is explicit in the guidelines, I’ve always used the cover (or spine if more detailed) order. That’s how non-classical releases are entered, and if there’s no set guidelines, I think a lot of people will fall back on that.
[1] Pictures at an Exhibition / Les Préludes is credited to Mussorgsky, Liszt; Herbert von Karajan, all recordings are credited to Philharmonia Orchestra which does not appear on the front cover.