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Sullivan Fortner doesn’t just play piano—he bends it to his will. This GRAMMY-winning musical shape-shifter merges New Orleans grit with fearless invention, twisting jazz traditions into something raw and urgent. His 2024 solo release Solo Game strips jazz to its bones, earning four-star raves from DownBeat and Télérama. With his band, Fortner celebrates the cosmic chaos of Sun Ra, channeling the icon’s boundary-smashing spirit through kinetic rhythms and searching harmonies. No pretense, no safety nets—just firebrand jazz at its most alive.

A beloved highlight of the season, this afternoon concert features a wind quintet from the world-renowned Chicago Symphony Orchestra. The dramatic program includes Mozart’s stormy Serenade for Winds in C Minor and Prokofiev’s gripping Romeo and Juliet Suite, capturing the most iconic moments of the timeless tragedy.

Passion, precision, and pure emotion lie at the heart of Belcea’s Quartet performances. Featuring Romanian violinist Corina Belcea, Korean Australian violinist Suyeon Kang, Polish violist Krzysztof Chorzelski, and French cellist Antoine Lederlin, this group melds four different artistic provenances to create unique excellence and unheard-of expressivity. Their in-demand international presence is highlighted by their tenure as the former Ensemble in Residence at Pierre Boulez Hall in Berlin and regular performances at the Vienna Konzerthaus. Belcea's return to UChicago features Mozart's "Dissonance Quartet," named for it's unusual opening measures, plus Beethoven's bittersweet, final string quartet and two short pieces by Mendelssohn.

Born from Lviv’s progressive Les Kurbas Theatre, Kurbasy channels ancient Ukrainian folklore through tight vocal harmonies, spectral instrumentation, and striking visual storytelling. Their performances are living rituals, weaving lullabies, calendar songs, and myths into a soundscape where past and present collide. Their latest work, Songs of the Ukrainian Forest, emerged in the shadow of invasion—a 14-song cycle tracing Ukraine’s landscapes and histories, sung in dialects that echo its shifting borders. This is music as a declaration: of freedom, of identity, of a culture that refuses to be silenced.

“Überhip” (Entertainment Weekly) 20-member band Alarm Will Sound takes on music from the arch-modernist to the pop-influenced. Committed to innovative performances and recordings of today’s music, Alarm Will Sound has been associated since its inception with composers at the forefront of contemporary music, premiering pieces by the likes of Steve Reich, Meredith Monk, and David Lang. The group itself includes many composer-performers, giving them an unusual insight into the creation and performance of new works. This “stylistically omnivorous” (The Log Journal) ensemble returns to Logan Center this October to perform and record two works by UChicago Professor of Composition, Hans Thomalla.

Cappella Pratensis transforms Renaissance polyphony from dusty manuscript to living sound. One of the world’s only ensembles to sing directly from historical notation, their collective voice brings 15th- and 16th-century music to life with an immersive, historically informed approach. Their performances blend scholarship with artistry, incorporating improvisation, liturgical reconstructions, and collaborations with actors, digital animators, and dancers. Their latest projects continue to push boundaries, proving that centuries-old music can still surprise, move, and resonate.

Raven Chacon, a Diné composer and sound artist, conjures sonic landscapes that pulse with history, resistance, and a responsiveness to place. His work—whether as a soloist, collaborator, or with the collective Postcommodity—weaves noise, chamber music, and Indigenous storytelling into something visceral and unshakable. A Pulitzer Prize winner and mentor to young Native composers, Chacon’s music hums with the echoes of the land and the tension of the present, challenging ears and expectations alike. Originally commissioned by the Renaissance Society at the University of Chicago, who co-present this performance, Chacon’s American Ledger No. 3 is scored for two women’s choirs and dedicated to journalist, activist, and Chicagoan Ida B. Wells. The piece is a powerful addition to the artist’s ongoing American Ledger series and is staged in Chicago for the first time.

Known for “desert island-worthy” performances (The Guardian) and interpretations “full of poetry, joy and sorrow, realised to such perfection” (The Observer), the London-based Castalian Quartet has distinguished itself as one of the most dynamic, sophisticated young string quartets performing today. As Royal Philharmonic Society prizewinners and the resident ensemble at Oxford University, the Castalian Quartet is taking the international chamber music scene by storm. The quartet has performed everywhere from Carnegie Hall to maximum security prisons to the Colombian rainforest, and now they bring their fierce sound to Logan Center in a program featuring works by Haydn, Janáček, and Brahms.

The Grossman Ensemble, in residence at the Chicago Center for Contemporary Composition, begins the 2025-26 concert season by adding four new works to its already impressive roster of 75 world premieres. Conductor Micah Gleason leads premieres by composers Kay Rhie, Ryan Chase, Mikel Kuehn, and Inés Thiebaut in a dynamic performance showcasing diverse and complex sonic worlds.

Two-time GRAMMY-nominated cellist Seth Parker Woods propels classical music into the future through projects that delve deep into our cultural fabric. GRAMMY-winning American classical singer Julia Bullock combines versatile artistry with a probing intellect and commanding stage presence. In a powerful collaboration with esteemed pianist Conor Hanick, this “cellist of power and grace” (The Guardian) and “velvety soprano shot through with steel” (Musical America) push the classical music envelope through daring programming and a shared social consciousness.