The National Symphony continues the initiative begun in the 2023–2024 season of producing an opera in concert led by Gianandrea Noseda. The Jan. 30-Feb. 1 offering is Samuel Barber’s Vanessa, with a cast including Sondra Radvanovsky (NSO debut), mezzo-soprano J’Nai Bridges, tenor Matthew Polenzani, mezzo-soprano Susan Graham, and baritone Thomas Hampson. https://www.kennedy-center.org/nso/home/2024-2025/noseda-barber/
North Carolina Opera’s company premiere of Catán’s Florencia en el Amazonas marks the first time NCO has presented a Spanish-language opera. Featuring Vanessa Vasquez and Richard Ollarsaba. Joseph Mechavich conducts this production by John Hoomes. (Jan. 31-Feb. 2) https://ncopera.org/2024-2025-season/
The world premiere of Billy Childs’ Concerto for Orchestra will take place Jan. 31-Feb. 1 with the San Diego Symphony under Rafael Payare. Alexander Malofeev will play Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto No. 3, and the program ends with Beethoven’s Third Symphony, Eroica. https://www.sandiegosymphony.org/performances/orchestral-evolution-childs-premiere-and-beethovens-eroica/
On Feb. 1-2, the Baltimore Symphony will celebrate Maurice Ravel’s 150th birthday in a program conducted by Robert Treviño. The Ravel selections include Alborada del gracioso, Rapsodie espagnole, Pavane pour une infante défunte and La Valse, which the composer described as a “choreographic poem for orchestra.” Karen Gomyo will be the soloist for Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto […]
As part of its 30th-anniversary season, Opera Lafayette, in collaboration with OperaCréole, will give the world-premiere concert performance of Edmund Dédé’s Morgiane, the first complete opera by a Black American. The four acts in French cover themes from Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves. Patrick Quigley directs a transcription co-written by OperaCréole founder Givonna Joseph […]
Nathalie Stutzmann makes a fiery Boston Symphony debut on Feb. 6-8 conducting Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite. Also making her debut is violinist Veronika Eberle, who will play Beethoven’s Violin Concerto. Between those two masterworks is Alborada del gracioco, originally a movement from Ravel’s Miroirs piano suite and later orchestrated by the composer. https://www.bso.org/events/beethoven-ravel-stravinsky?performance=2025-02-06-19:30
Fabio Luisi and the Dallas Symphony will give the world premiere of a new work by Native American, Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Raven Chacon Feb. 6-9; it will be Chacon’s first major composition for orchestra. In that same program, Alexander Kerr will play the Bruch Violin Concerto, and Luisi will lead Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5. https://www.dallassymphony.org/productions/beethovens-5th-symphony/
Opera Theatre of St. Louis presents its New Works Collective, a trio of new short operas: Black Coffee, by Concert Black and Alicia Revé Like, deals with building a life after a move. Family Style, by Meilina Tsui and Melisa Tien, deals with sacrifices made by immigrant parents. Tim Amukele and Jarrod Lee’s Kandake takes […]
Opera Carolina will open its 75th season with Carmen on Feb. 6-9. This is also the 25th year of James Meenan’s role as artistic director. https://www.carolinatix.org/events/detail/opera-carolina-carmen
Daniela Candillari makes her conducting debut with the Kansas City Symphony on Feb. 7-9, leading the orchestra in Ellen Reid’s Floodplain and the Shostakovich 10th Symphony. Karen Gomyo will solo in Prokofiev’s First Violin Concerto. https://tickets.kcsymphony.org/22169
It’s the perfect Valentine date opera: The Dallas Opera presents Gluck’s Orpheus and Eurydice. Gluck’s original 1762 score will be conducted by music director Emmanuel Villaume, leading The Dallas Opera Orchestra and Chorus. This new production is directed and designed by Joachim Schamberger and will feature countertenor Hugh Cutting and soprano Madison Leonard. (Feb. 7-15) […]
Toledo Symphony will play the U.S. premiere of Steward Goodyear’s Life, Life, Life, a tribute to his mother, on Feb. 7-8. Goodyear will also be the piano soloist for Rachmaninoff’s Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini. Alain Trudel also conducts Beethoven’s Coriolan Overture and Liszt’s Les Préludes. https://www.artstoledo.com/masterworks-24-25
The Des Moines Symphony welcomes the debut of conductor Mei-Ann Chen on Feb. 8-9 in a wide-ranging program. The concert opens with Florence Price’s Dance of the Canebrakes, a lively work inspired by African American folk music. Anne Marie McDermott performs Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 1. Rachmaninoff’s dramatic Symphonic Dances close the evening. https://www.dmsymphony.org/concerts-events/chen-conducts-rachmaninoff/
New World Symphony’s 2024-25 season marks the fourth year of its “I Dream a World” festival, centering on the transition between the Harlem Renaissance and the Civil Rights Movement. On Feb. 8-9, conductor Jeri Lynne Johnson, founder and artistic director of the Philadelphia-based Black Pearl Chamber Orchestra in her NWS debut, leads a special cabaret […]
The harp-and-piano duo Couloir will perform in the Vancouver Chamber Music Society series on Feb. 10-12. Besides a transcription of a classic—Schubert’s Arpeggione Sonata—harpist Heidi Krutzen and pianist Ariel Barnes will play works by two living composers, Caroline Lizotte and Jeffrey Ryan. https://www.vancouverchambermusic.com/couloir
The Escher Quartet with Jordan Bak, viola, will play the world premiere of a new Viola Quintet by Chris Rogerson, presented by Chamber Music Houston, which commissioned the work. Also on the Feb. 11 program are Mendelssohn’s Quartet in F minor and Brahms’ Viola Quintet No. 2. https://chambermusichouston.org/concerts/2025-02-11-escher/
Theatre of Voices’ Feb. 11 program at Carnegie Hall features two U.S. premieres: a new work by Julia Wolfe and A Brief Descent into Deep Time by John Luther Adams. Michael Gordon’s A Western opens this program conducted by Theatre of Voices founder Paul Hillier. https://www.carnegiehall.org/calendar/2025/02/11/theatre-of-voices-0730pm
Pianist Teo Gheorghiu makes his Symphony Nova Scotia debut playing Schumann’s Piano Concerto under conductor Andrei Feher. The Feb. 13 program, which will also be livestreamed, opens with Anna Clyne’s Stride and closes with Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony, Pastoral. https://symphonynovascotia.ca/concerts-and-tickets/concerts/rebecca-cohn-auditorium/beethovens-pastoral-symphony/
Cellist Abel Selaocoe will be the special guest artist with the St. Paul Chamber Orchstra’s Feb. 14-16 program, which Selaocoe will also conduct. Pieces include Stravinsky’s Dumbarton Oaks and two works by Selaocoe, both featuring percussionist Bernhard Schimpelsberger. https://content.thespco.org/events/four-spirits-with-abel-selaocoe/
It’s rare that an orchestra concert includes multiple works that are new to the ensemble. But that is the case in the Minnesota Orchestra’s Feb. 14-15 program, when Paolo Bortolameolli will conduct Miguel Farías’ evocative Retratos Australes, Gabriela Ortiz’s blazing Violin Concerto (with Susie Park), and Silvestre Revueltas’ La noche de los mayas. https://www.minnesotaorchestra.org/tickets/calendar/classical/susie-park-plays-ortiz/
PALETTE, a new work by Anna Clyne, will receive its world premiere by the St. Louis Symphony under conductor Stéphane Denève. Nikolai Lugansky will solo in Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2, and the program closes with Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet Overture-Fantasy (appropriate for the Feb. 14 concert). https://shop.slso.org/8095
What a way to celebrate Valentine's Day! Milwaukee’s Florentine Opera will perform Handel’s Acis & Galatea Feb. 14-16. Francesco Milioto conducts members of the Milwaukee Symphony in this production directed by E. Loren Meeker. https://www.florentineopera.org/season-events/acis-galatea-24-25
Joining the Vermont Symphony on Feb. 15, Stephen Hough will play his own first piano concerto (The World of Yesterday, an East Coast premiere) as well as that of Mendelssohn. The program also includes a symphonic poem by Wojciech Kilar and a piece by Anna Clyne. Music director Andrew Crust conducts. https://www.vso.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Feb-1.png
Violinist Sergey Khachatryan will make his debut on Feb. 19-20 playing the Tchaikovsky concerto with Rafael Payare on the podium. Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 11, The Year 1905, completes the program. https://www.osm.ca/en/concert/tchaikovskys-lustrous-violin-concerto
As part of their annual Carnegie Hall season, The Knights will collaborate with singer-songwriter Aoife O’Donovan. The Feb. 20 program includes an arrangement of O’Donovan’s America, Come as well as Mendelssohn’s Scottish Symphony, to be followed by Colin Jacobsen playing Scottish fiddle tunes with the orchestra. https://www.carnegiehall.org/calendar/2025/02/20/the-knights-0730pm
On Feb. 20 at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, pianist Juho Pohjonen will give the world premiere of Jyrki Linjama’s Prélude oublié. Other works in this recital include two sonatas by Scriabin, Liszt’s Après une Lecture du Dante, and Beethoven’s Sonata Op. 27, No. 1. https://www.chambermusicsociety.org/our-concerts/at-lincoln-center/events/24-25/juho-pohjonen/
Allison Loggins-Hull’s Can You See?, originally a chamber work, will receive a performance of its new version for full orchestra by the New Jersey Symphony on Feb. 20-23. Christoph König conducts pianist Tony Siqi Yun in Chopin’s Concerto No. 1, and the program concludes with Brahms’ dramatic First Symphony. https://www.njsymphony.org/events/detail/brahms-and-chopin
On Feb. 21-23, the San Francisco Symphony will present the world premiere of a new work by Xavier Muzik, winner of the 2023 Emerging Black Composers Project Michael Morgan Prize. Daniil Trifonov will solo in Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto No. 2, and music director Esa-Pekka Salonen will close the program with Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring. https://www.sfsymphony.org/Buy-Tickets/2024-25/salonen-trifonov
With music by Chandler Carter and a libretto by Diana Solomon-Glover, This Little Light of Mine is inspired by the life of Fannie Lou Hamer, a former Mississippi sharecropper’s daughter who rose to national prominence at the 1964 Democratic National Convention. Kentucky Opera will present this work Feb. 21-23. https://kyopera.org/this-little-light/
An excerpt of Rhiannon Giddens and Michael Abels’ Pulitzer Prize-winning opera Omar will open the North Carolina Symphony’s Feb. 21-22 program, conducted by Carlos Miguel Prieto. After Brahms’ Alto Rhapsody, the North Carolina Master Chorale and soloists yet to be announced will join the orchestra in Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. https://www.ncsymphony.org/events/629/beethoven-symphony-no-9/
The world premiere of a new work by Hannah Ishizaki will be played by the Pittsburgh Symphony Feb. 21-23. In this program conducted by Manfred Honeck, Emanuel Ax will be the soloist for Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 25, and the evening concludes with Korngold’s Symphony in F-Sharp Major. https://www.pittsburghsymphony.org/production/92957/emanuel-ax-plays-mozart-plus-world-premiere
Music director Robert Spano, on piano, will be joined by other musicians from the Fort Worth Symphony in a program of chamber music. The Feb. 23 concert includes the string sextet version of Schoenberg’s Verklärte Nacht (Transfigured Night) as well as Brahms’ Piano Quartet No. 1 in G minor. https://fwsymphony.org/concerts-tickets/24-25-season/chamber-series/brahms-and-schoenberg
On Feb. 23, Turtle Island String Quartet will appear as a guest of St. Paul Chamber Orchestra, which does not perform on the program. The evening features a chamber-concert verson of Fire Shut Up in My Bones, by Terence Blanchard, with vocalists Nicholas Newton and Adrienne Danrich. https://content.thespco.org/events/fire-shut-up-in-my-bones-with-the-turtle-island-quartet/
On Feb. 24 at Chamber Music Pittsburgh, Grammy-nominated vocalist Nicholas Phan and early music ensemble Les Délices weave together Baroque masterpieces with the world premiere of a new work by Vietnamese-American composer Viet Cuong. The program also includes works by Michel Pignolet de Montéclair, Marin Marais, and François Couperin. https://www.chambermusicpittsburgh.org/lesdelices-nicholasphan/
Pianist Yunchan Lam, youngest-ever winner of the Van Cliburn Competition, makes his San Francisco debut on Feb. 25 in a recital on the Chamber Music SF series. He will play Bach’s Goldberg Variations and Webern’s Variations, Op. 27. https://chambermusicsf.org/
Thomas Adès will conduct Kirill Gerstein and the Toronto Symphony in the Canadian premiere of his Piano Concerto on Feb. 26-March 1. The program opens with “Paradiso” from Adès’ Dante and closes with Holst’s The Planets. https://www.tso.ca/concerts-and-events/events/holsts-the-planets/
Every work on Third Coast Percussion’s Feb. 27 Carnegie Hall program will be a New York City premiere. These include pieces by Tigran Hamasyan, Jessie Montgomery, and Zakir Hussain; a master on Indian tablas, Hussain will be on hand to solo in his composition. https://www.carnegiehall.org/calendar/2025/02/27/third-coast-percussion-0730pm
In its third installment of the Sonic Spectrum series this season, Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center will present the world premiere of a new work for flute, piano, and percussion by Philadelphia-based composer Elise Arancio. Other composers on the Feb. 27 bill are Liza Lim, Tonia Ko, Elaine Lillios, and more. https://www.chambermusicsociety.org/our-concerts/at-lincoln-center/events/24-25/sonic-spectrum-iii-2425/
Italian conductor Valentina Peleggi makes her debut with the Indianapolis Symphony Feb. 28-March 1. Joyce Yang will be the soloist in Prokofiev’s Piano Concerto No. 3. Anna Clyne's Masquerade opens the program, which closes with Rimsky-Korsakov’s exotic Scheherazade. https://www.indianapolissymphony.org/event/scheherazade/
Na’Zir McFadden conducts the world premiere of a new work by (and featuring) DSO trumpeter Kris Johnson. The Feb. 28-March 1 program, called Classical Roots, also features two pieces by Jessie Montgomery: Snapshots and Rounds, the latter featuring pianist Awadagin Pratt. https://www.dso.org/events-and-tickets/events/24-25-winter/classical-roots
In a March 1 Carnegie Hall program called Noche de Fantasías, Orpheus Chamber Orchestra will give the New York premiere of a new work by Jorge Amado. The Orpheus will also play pieces by Gabriela Ortiz and M. Ponce, and guitarist Pablo Sáinz-Villegas will solo in Rodrigo’s Fantasia para un gentilhombre. https://www.carnegiehall.org/calendar/2025/03/01/orpheus-chamber-orchestra---pablo-sainz-villegas-0700pm
Shira Samuels-Shragg makes her debut conducting the Spokan Symphony on March 1-2. Gabrielle Després will be the soloist in Erich Korngold’s Violin Concerto in D major. The program opens with Quinn Mason’s festive Toast of the Town Overture and concludes with Dvořák’s Seventh Symphony, From the New World. https://foxtheaterspokane.org/event/masterworks-6-l-a-stories/
In “Music in (Techni)Color” on March 1-2, New World Symphony and conductor Stéphane Denève will present the East Coast premiere of composer Anna Clyne’s PALETTE, the latest in her and sound designer Jody Elff’s revolutionary interactive sonic experiences for Augmented Orchestra (AO). Also on the program is Ravel’s Mother Goose Suite as well as Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition. […]
The New England Philharmonic plays two Boston premieres to celebrate composer Yehudi Wyner’s 95th birthday on March 2: Chaya Czernowin’s Once I Blinked Nothing Was the Same and Bobby Ge’s Remember to Have Fun. Wyner’s own Prologue and Narrative is also on the program, along with works by Keeril Makan and Marti Epstein. https://nephilharmonic.org/concerts/new-music-new-england-2025
