Composer

The Pēteris Vasks Quartet is a special project, on the occasion of the composer’s 80th birthday in 2026, bringing together four great Latvian musicians to perform in Latvia and across Europe. The quartet’s program focuses on Olivier Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time, an eight-movement masterpiece of 20th-century chamber music, first performed in a war camp in 1941. This work is very dear to Pēteris Vasks, inspiring him to write his piano trio Episodi e Canto Perpetuo in 1985, also in eight movements (performed in an extended concert version). Arvo Partē’s Fratres is included in the program at Pēteris Vasks’ request.

Peter Vasks – 80

Paliesius Manor

Violinist Njioma Grevious brings her "vibrant and compelling" artistry to the Music Room following her previous performances as a founding member of the Abeo Quartet (2023-24 Ernst Stiefel String Quartet-in-Residence).  She is a winner of both the Robert F. Smith First Prize and the Audience Choice Award at the 2023 Sphinx Competition and received a prestigious 2024 Avery Fisher Career Grant. She has an active solo career and has made recent debuts with the Chicago and National Symphony Orchestras.

Njioma Grevious, violin & Andrew Goodridge, piano

The Rosen House at Caramoor

Rediscovered and published posthumously in 2007, Messiaen’s early Fantaisie sets the mood for Carolin Widmann’s uplifting recital with her long-term duo partner Alexander Lonquich. The German violinist, praised by BBC Music Magazine for her ‘beguiling subtlety of phrasing, tonal colour and dynamic shading’, continues with three different approaches to the sonata genre, each distinguished by their bold ideas and abundance of melodic invention.

EPSG:4326

Carolin Widmann violin; Alexander Lonquich piano

Wigmore Hall

Admired for the strength and conviction of his individual interpretations and phenomenal technical command at the keyboard, George Xiaoyuan Fu has been hailed by The Arts Desk as ‘one of the most exciting young pianists of our time, no question’. The American musician, a seasoned composer as well as performer, presents a programme that reflects the breadth of his artistry and profound feeling for the piano’s tonal colours and textural nuances.

George Xiaoyuan Fu piano

Musical modernism in the 20th Century, contrary to views expressed by conservative critics, came in an arresting diversity of styles, as Hugo Ticciati and Pierre-Laurent Aimard confirm with their choice of recital repertoire. Messiaen’s yearning Theme and Variations raises the curtain on the rhapsodic intensity of Schoenberg’s last instrumental work and Janáček’s impassioned Sonata, before the programme turns to music by three gloriously individual American moderns.

Hugo Ticciati violin; Pierre-Laurent Aimard piano

2026 Sunday Morning Concert

Libbey Park

Awarded the Polar Music Prize in 2025, soprano and conductor Barbara Hannigan is one of the most charismatic and versatile artists of our time. In Blaibach, she will sing two magnificent song cycles with Bertrand Chamayou, who will also be heard as the eminent Scriabin soloist: Olivier Messiaen's "Chants de terre et de ciel" and John Zorn's "Jumalattaret." Sensual vocal pearls oscillate between lyrical simplicity and fascinating complexity—a major vocal event.

Barbara Hannigan & Bertrand Chamayou

Blaibach Concert Hall

Olivier Messiaen's Turangalîla Symphony is a work that has it all. Inspired by both Hindu scriptures and the medieval tale of Tristan and Isolde, the symphony is intoxicating and seductive, terrifying and beautiful in equal measure. The intensely colorful sound universe with a full percussion section, a virtuoso piano voice and the early electronic instrument ondes martenot is unparalleled in the history of music.

Esa-Pekka Salonen & Turangalîla

DR Koncerthuset

Simon Johnson became Master of Music at Westminster Cathedral in September 2021, following 13 years as the Organist and Assistant Director of Music at St Paul’s Cathedral. He was involved in all of the national occasions that took place at St Paul’s during this time, playing for Her Majesty the Queen, the Dalai Lama, as well as numerous Prime Ministers and Archbishops.

Simon Johnson

Douai Abbey

Welcome to an evening in the spirit of love, where the singers of the DR Vocal Ensemble explore virtuoso and expressive choral music.

Songs of Love with the DR Vocal Ensemble

Trinity Church Copenhagen

Several curious anecdotes surround the renowned French philosopher Michel Foucault. His LSD trip in Death Valley, California, is legendary: one weekend in 1975, he accepted an invitation from Assistant Professor Simeon Wade. It has now been definitively established that this is no legend. Moreover, this LSD trip profoundly altered Foucault's life and thought.

Shattered Worlds / LSD

Stadtcasino Basel

Cologne Philharmonie

Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time has assumed near-mythical status since its premiere 85 years ago at a prisoner-of-war camp, performed in freezing midwinter to hundreds of fellow inmates.

With the outbreak of World War II Messiaen had been drafted into the French army but was captured in 1940 and sent to the Stalag VIII-A camp near Görlitz. There he found himself imprisoned with three other professional musicians – a violinist, clarinettist and cellist – and began writing for the unusual ensemble circumstance had thrown together.

The piece was inspired by apocalyptic visions from the Book of Revelation, but its title was double-edged: it also represented the end of a clockwork, periodic musical time that had held sway for centuries.

Berkeley Ensemble with Libby Burgess, piano

Smith Square Hall

Imagine an explosion of love on a cosmic scale. Mix in 1940s film score, a pounding rhythmic workout and the sounds of a Javanese gamelan, all washed in blissful impressionist colours. Now add a huge orchestra, a world-class pianist and a vintage electronic instrument straight out of science fiction and you’re still not even halfway to imagining Messiaen’s mind-boggling Turangalîla-Symphonie. 77 years after its premiere, it still sounds like nothing on earth.

Messiaen's Turangalîla

Royal Festival Hall

Get up close and personal for an experience you'll never forget. Sit on stage, surrounding a quartet of RSO musicians, for a once-in-a-lifetime performance of Olivier Messiaen's Quartet for the End of Time. Written in a WWII Concentration Camp, this piece will touch your soul and leave you utterly transformed.

Quartet for the End of Time

University of Redlands

Australian conductor Simone Young returns to lead the LA Phil in Olivier Messiaen’s epic and gripping symphony. The Washington Post said Young has a “handle on grandeur—how to grow, manage, sustain and tame it,” which is a trait needed for Messiaen’s near 80-minute “more is more” symphony. Inspired by the tragic romance of Tristan and Isolde, Turangalîla-symphonie is an orchestral tour-de-force that is at times carnal, at others mystical, and always leans into transcendent excess. Young weaves together sounds of bird song and imposing pre-colonial Mexican statues, punctuated by massive brass and percussion, the eerie electronic hum of an ondes martenot, and special lighting effects that nod to the composer’s synesthesia—all coming together for Messiaen’s sweeping expression of all-consuming love.

Turangalîla

Walt Disney Concert Hall

Leah Amory, violin

Curtis Institute of Music

Passion music - meditation

Church of Holmen

The intimacy of Schubert’s graceful Andantino Varié for piano four-hands sits alongside the grandness of Messiaen’s Interstellar Call for solo horn, inspired by the canyons of Utah. We encounter Luciano Berio, one of the leading voices of the European post-war avant garde, in virtuosic (Psy for solo double bass) and introspective (Wasserklavier for solo piano) moods.

Nightfall: Elgar, Berio, Messiaen, Schubert

Female composers, cultural identities, contemporary music: Junyan Chen's interests are as broad as her talent is impressive. At the 2024 Leeds International Piano Competition, she not only won second prize, but also the Chamber Music Prize and the Alexandra Dariescu Award – a talent worth keeping an eye on! At ProArte, the young artist will search for connections between times and places with a multifaceted program: works by François Couperin will be presented alongside Maurice Ravel's homage to his fellow Baroque composer. Ravel's famous "La valse" and works by Olivier Messiaen reveal further facets of French soundscapes for solo piano. And with Amy Beach's "Variations on Balkan Themes," a transatlantic cultural encounter joins the pattern of connecting lines.

Discover Talent: Junyan Chen / Piano Recital

Elbphilharmonie Hamburg

When the Sydney Opera House Grand Organ roars to life the sound will shake the Concert Hall with its deep, resonant power – and just wait until you hear Anna Lapwood play. Her playing is technically brilliant, but her warmth and contagious energy makes this an unmissable event.

Saint-Saëns’ Organ Symphony

Sydney Opera House

The deaths of Shostakovich, Louis Armstrong, Jimi Hendrix and Janis Joplin and the disbanding of the Beatles was set against Miles Davis’ jazz/rock fusion revolution and the birth of heavy metal (Black Sabbath) and techno (Kraftwerk).

Cocktail Hour with Timothy Constable

What happens when music breathes, when sound drifts like mist, or lingers like falling rain? For Japanese composer Tōru Takemitsu, silence was as meaningful as any note. One of the most important voices of the postwar era, Takemitsu drew deep inspiration from nature, composing music that feels both intimate and expansive, rooted in stillness and mystery. 

In Between Sound and Silence, the London Sinfonietta brings Takemitsu’s world to life. You'll hear his beautiful, meditative works such as - Rain Coming, and And Then I Knew ’Twas Wind - alongside music by composers who inspired him, including Debussy, Messiaen, and Webern. Their influence helped shape Takemitsu’s unique sound: rich in colour, alive with detail, yet always deeply human. 

Toru Takemitsu: Between Sound And Silence

Southbank Centre

Fritz specialises in both contemporary and classical music, applying experiments with electronics and gut strings to a broad repertoire. For this performance in LSO St Luke’s, the programme explores the complex tension between doubt and faith, from Schumann’s Five Pieces in Folk Style, through a movement from Messiaen’s startling Quatour pour le fin du temps, to more contemporary works, such as Mikołaj Majkusiak’s Rhythms of Doubt, and a brand new ECHO commission by Jennifer Walshe.

ECHO Rising Stars: Valerie Fritz

LSO St Luke's

In this unique world premiere, we hear Laura Bowler’s composition inspired by The White Book by Nobel Prize-winner Han Kang. The work was commissioned by Principal Guest Conductor Barbara Hannigan, who also sings at this performance. With the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra and choir.

The White Book

Göteborgs Symfoniker

David Orlowsky is an ace on the clarinet: with him, the clarinet laughs, cries, sings, and laments as if it had a voice of its own. The expressive spectrum he coaxes from his versatile instrument is certainly tremendous. The clarinetist, who makes his debut with the Duisburg Philharmonic with this concerto, is equally at home in classical music and in klezmer music, which he first encountered through his mentor and teacher Giora Feidman. And this specifically Jewish musical tradition plays a central role in Osvaldo Golijov's suspenseful suite "The Dreams and Prayers of Isaac the Blind," in which the composer tells a kind of history of Judaism—from its beginnings with Abraham to the present day. Olivier Messiaen's "Hymn" also has a religious reference, in this case to the "Holy Sacrament" of the Eucharist. Although the score was lost in the Second World War, the composer later reconstructed it from memory. In the second half of the concert, Robert Treviño , who courageously stepped in for Eun Sun Kim , who was ill at the Philharmonic's 9th Symphony in December 2022, conducts Jean Sibelius's Symphony No. 2, which evokes its creator's closeness to nature and the vastness of the Finnish landscapes. Also ingenious is the way the composer constructs an entire symphony from a small three-note motif at the beginning – right up to the grandiose finale.

Dreams and prayers

CityPalais

Takemitsu - Portsmouth

Guildhall Square

Jason Hardink, Piano

Alice Pratt Brown Hall

The geomungo, a traditional Korean instrument whose name translates to “black crane zither”, embodies an extraordinary and powerful spirit that serves as the focus of Black Dragon, a captivating concerto by Honolulu composer Donald Reid Womack. Experience the world premiere of the version for Western orchestra, performed by the sought-after geomungo virtuoso Yoon Jeong Heo.  Led by Music and Artistic Director Dane Lam, themes of theology and mythology weave together in a spellbinding program including Messiaen's Les Offrandes Oubliées and Brahms' Symphony No. 4.

Brahms and the Black Dragon

Hawaii Theatre

The timeless art of the recital is perpetuated in the hands of present-day masters of the genre.

David Byrd-Marrow & Cory Smythe

Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center

French soprano Axelle Fanyo makes her Boston debut with a captivating program showcasing the vocal brilliance and emotional depth that have defined her rising career on opera and recital stages. Praised for her extraordinary expressiveness, Fanyo “does not only embody a character, she tells us the story. She clearly cultivates the art of communication, which gives her singing another dimension” (Forum Opéra).

Axelle Fanyo, soprano & Julius Drake, piano

Longy School of Music of Bard College

Quartet for the End of Time (Quatuor pour la fin du temps), is a quartet in eight movements for clarinet, violin, cello, and piano by the French composer Olivier Messiaen. The piece premiered on 15 January 1941, at the Stalag VIIIA prisoner-of-war camp, in Görlitz, Germany, where the composer had been confined since his capture in May 1940. The work’s instrumentation was determined by the instruments and performers at hand.

Regina Musical Club - Messiaen: Quartet for the End of Time

Darke Hall

One of the most promising singers of her generation, French soprano Axelle Fanyo has been praised by Renée Fleming for her “charismatic, beautiful voice [of] real star quality.” In her PCMS debut program with the “unfailingly eloquent and supportive” pianist Julius Drake (The Telegraph), Fanyo explores the master and apprentice relationship between two pioneering European composers, Arnold Schoenberg and Olivier Messaien, and their American protegés, John Cage and William Bolcom.

Axelle Fanyo, soprano Julius Drake, piano

Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts

A rare Houston performance from Grammy Award-winning classical vocalist Julia Bullock, admired both for her critically-acclaimed performances at the Metropolitan Opera as well as original, boundary-breaking recitals of astounding intensity. Appearing here with frequent collaborator and virtuosic soloist Conor Hanick, these two luminous musicians shine their collective light one of the vocal masterpieces of the 20th century.

Julia Bullock, soprano; Conor Hanick, piano | Harawi

Wortham Theater Center

Hungarian composer Márton Illés’ violin concerto Vont-tér is an ethereal, playful work of kaleidoscopic sounds and effects.

London Symphony Orchestra/Robert Treviño

Barbican Centre

Organ music for Mozart's birthday with Hannfried Lucke

Mozarteum Foundation

The organists of the Church of Saint-Sulpice in Paris are among the superstars of their profession. Charles-Marie Widor held this post for 64 years, followed by the legendary Marcel Dupré, who shaped organ music in one of the world’s most famous churches for decades. Since February 2023, Karol Mossakowski has held the prestigious position of titular organist at Saint-Sulpice.

Organ matinee

Berliner Philharmoniker

In the Audience Orchestra, dedicated amateurs rehearse with great enthusiasm and at a very high artistic level under conductor Michael Petermann, the director of the Hamburger Konservatorium. Each year the orchestra gives two performances in the Grand Hall and further concerts in Hamburg districts, in which they play the pieces they’ve been practicing so intensively.

Elbphilharmonie Audience Orchestra

ROCO’s Connections Series continues with Quartet for All Time, a program of emotional resonance. Through a selection of thoughtfully curated works, this concert exhibits music’s power to reflect and uplift in times of grief and remembrance.

Featuring Rebecca Fischer (violin), Alexis Gerlach (cello), Nathan Williams (clarinet), and Audrey Andrist (piano), the evening honors personal and collective memory through music that speaks across generations and traditions, inviting audiences to reflect on the role of music in preserving hope and history.

ROCO Connections: Quartet for All Time

Texas Southern University

Debussy’s impressionistic symphonic tone poems, La mer and Ibéria, take center stage in this all-French–Iberian-peninsula program. Mezzo-soprano Angela Brower is the soloist for Berlioz’s cantata Cléopâtre, on the first of her two weeks with the TSO, and Maestro Gomez introduces the music of Olivier Messiaen with the grief-stricken Le tombeau resplendissant.

Debussy’s La mer

Linda Ronstadt Music Hall

Barbara Hannigan takes us on an emotional journey filled with birdsong and star-crossed lovers. Joining her with the Gothenburg Symphony Orchestra is friend Bertrand Chamayou, performing Ravel’s hopeful and jazz-inspired Piano Concerto.

Meeting of Masters: Ravel & Messiaen

From the profound sense of wonder in awe of the unfathomable beauty of the rocky landscapes in Utah/North America, all the way up to the overarching panoply of the stars – thus one might imagine the energy field inhabited by Olivier Messiaen as he wrote this masterpiece of compositional architecture and sound in colourful splendour. From the depths of the canyons, through the stars, and into paradise.

Elbphilharmonie: From the Gorges to the Stars

Deep gorges, large rock pyramids in intense colors, vast forests and a breathtakingly wide starry sky: In his sound-painting work »Des canyons aux étoiles« (»From the Canyons to the Stars«), Olivier Messiaen invites you on a journey through the impressive national parks of the US state of Utah, which he once visited himself.

Klangforum Wien / Ingo Metzmacher

Barbara Hannigan and pianist Bertrand Chamayou have garnered acclaim in the US and Europe for their chamber music programme. Hear John Zorn’s dazzling song cycle Jumalattaret, paired with music by Messiaen and Scriabin.

Hannigan sings John Zorn

Austrian cellist Valerie Fritz loves the extraordinary, the unusual. Even at the beginning of her studies at the Mozarteum Salzburg, she knew that a classical career with the standard repertoire was out of the question for her. Her self-confidence has already taken the young artist far: she has been nominated by the Elbphilharmonie, among others, and is a "Rising Star" in the European Concert Hall Organization (ECHO) season. With accordionist Goran Stevanovich, she explores the spatial, acoustic, and interpersonal aspects of the concert setting with music from Bach to the present day.

Valerie Fritz, Violoncello

Sternschluchten

Wiener Konzerthaus

The always-evolving Met Orchestra Chamber Ensemble features musicians from the legendary Met Orchestra in a variety of unique programs. Together, along with special guest artists from the Metropolitan Opera and beyond, they explore a boundless world of chamber music, adapting to fit the instrumental needs of any piece—from all-time classics to hard-to-find hidden gems and standout works by many of today’s significant composers. Star soprano Erin Morley joins as soloist in this program of works by Mozart, Schubert, and Messiaen.

The Met Orchestra Chamber Ensemble 2026 Concert 3

Carnegie Hall

'La Nativité du Seigneur' – The Nativity of the Lord – is a large organ work by Olivier Messiaen, which describes the prophecies of Jesus' birth and death and the events surrounding Christmas itself and the Epiphany.

Concert - La Nativité du Seigneur

Church of Our Lady Copenhagen

Jonas Olsson, Norrlandsoperan's own pianist, returns with Olivier Messiaen's Vingt Regards sur l'Enfant-Jésus – a piano work that is considered one of the most significant of the 20th century. A piano concert in the spirit of Christmas with music to immerse yourself in and be overwhelmed by.

Twenty Reflections on the Child Jesus

Norrlandsoperan

In this colourful programme, we encounter the pairing of the conductor Simon Rattle and mezzo-soprano Magdalena Kožená. In Debussy’s Nocturnes we find traces of his inspiration from nocturnal paintings of rivers. Messiaen’s Poèmes pour Mi plays with surrealistic, spiritual, and romantic colours. Gustav Mahler does not hold anything back, either—his Fourth Symphony includes a vocal part.

Czech Philharmonic • Magdalena Kožená

Rudolfinum

There is no better way to start Advent Sunday than with a varied, atmospheric organ concert: Christian Schmitt, renowned concert organist with a professorship at the Rotterdam Conservatory, invites you to a matinee with a program that presents the "queen of instruments" from the most beautiful romanticism to a piece exclusively for the pedals (i.e. played with the feet!).

Christian Schmitt, organ

Hear OSL members play one of the most extraordinary works of the 20th century. Composed in a German prisoner-of-war camp during the brutal winter of 1940-41, Olivier Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time was written for the instruments available—clarinet, violin, cello, and piano—and first performed by fellow prisoners before an audience of 400 inmates and guards.

Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time

The DiMenna Center for Classical Music

Winner of the 2024 Musical Fund Society Career Advancement Award, Anika Kildegaard is quickly distinguishing herself as one of the most promising American vocalists specializing in new music and concert repertoire. Fresh off her Carnegie Hall and Boston Symphony Orchestra debuts, this frequent member of the award winning vocal ensemble The Crossing debuts with PCMS in a recital that highlights selections from three song cycles that grapple with the intensity of love and loss in the human experience.

Anika Kildegaard, soprano Daniel Schreiner, piano

 Benjamin Franklin Hall

To shed light on religion, we have invited military chaplain Michael Hemmingsen of the Church of Isaiah, who gives his perspective on life.

Religion

Østerbro Koncertforening

Joined by the phenomenal soprano Lucy Crowe, we journey across centuries and styles. From Handel and Haydn’s bright elegance to the vivid, kaleidoscopic textures of Messiaen, and from Berg’s exquisite The Nightingale to Gershwin’s jazz-tinged lyricism, come for an inspiring and beautiful range of music. Soar through centuries of music with one of the country’s most exciting orchestras and finest of singers.

Fantasia Orchestra with Lucy Crowe: Birdsong

Juno Award winner, UNESCO Ambassador, and alumnus of The Royal Conservatory’s Glenn Gould School, Jan Lisiecki plays Preludes by Chopin, Bach, Messiaen, and Rachmaninov.

Jan Lisiecki, piano

The Royal Conservatory of Music

KONTRAST - Looking on Darkness

The Royal Danish Academy of Music

Discover the sublime in Messiaen’s transcendent L’Ascension. Stefan Jackiw takes on Berg’s moving Violin Concerto, an homage to innocence lost, while Strauss’ Death and Transfiguration provides a powerful exploration of life’s ultimate journey. Music Director Jun Märkl conducts this concert of reflective depth and stirring melodies.  

Transformations of Spirit: Jackiw plays Berg

Hilbert Circle Theatre

Two deeply religious composers open up the concert season of the Staatsphilharmonie Nürnberg in the Meistersingerhalle. Olivier Messiaen hoped to use his first large, suggestive orchestral work Les Offrandes oubliées to turn the colours of church windows into sound. Anton Bruckner was no less spiritual in his own goals for his music. In his 7th Symphony, which marked his breakthrough as a great symphonic composer, he most clearly describes humanity's ascent from hardship and the joys of life toward divine light.

Bruck­ner – Mes­sia­en

Meistersingerhalle

Liebestod , literally "death of love," refers to the famous finale of Richard Wagner's opera Tristan and Isolde . In this tragic scene, Isolde dies before Tristan's lifeless body. The term more broadly evokes the radical idea of ​​love made perfect by death.

Songs of love and death

Lille Opera

L'Ascension

Maggio Musicale Fiorentino Theatre

Sensational young pianist Martin James Bartlett takes on the thunderous opening chords of Tchaikovsky’s Piano Concerto No. 1 as the Ann Arbor Symphony Orchestra launches their brand-new season at Hill Auditorium. Plus, Music Director Earl Lee leads the A2SO in works by Ravel in honor of the 150th anniversary of the composer’s birth.

Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 1

University of Michigan

Michael Schønwandt conducts the Southern Jutland Symphony Orchestra in our unofficial, recurring season opening: Rued Langgaard Festival – an evening that, as usual, explores Langgaard's most visionary works.

The whole thing begins evocatively with Messiaen's motet O Sacrum Convivium! and then features Langgaard's concert piece The Star in the East, which is heavenly music with soprano Louise McClelland as soloist. This is followed by Symphony No. 6, - a dramatic main work with strong ties to the opera Antichrist, which the orchestra has previously performed with great success. After the interval, Ludolf Nielsen's nature-depicting Skovvandring will be performed, and the concert will conclude with Langgaard's choral work Fra Dybet, performed by a united choir of young, talented singers. Michael Schønwandt has been one of Denmark's leading conductors for almost 50 years. Chief conductor and music director of the Royal Danish Orchestra. Theatre and Orchestra 2000-2013, chief conductor of the Berliner Sinfonie-Orchester 1992-98, 1st guest conductor of the Danish Radio Symphony Orchestra 1889-2000, chief conductor of the Opera and Orchestra in Montpellier 2015-23 are just some of the orchestras he has been associated with over time.

Rued Langgaard Festival

Ribe Cathedral

The in-demand conductor Karina Canellakis returns after making her Edinburgh International Festival debut in the 2023 Closing Concert. She leads this monumental programme with the Edinburgh Festival Chorus and the BBC SSO, characterised by thrilling sounds and ideas of love, divine or human.

EIF: Bernstein & Stravinsky

The Usher Hall

The in-demand Karina Canellakis returns after making her International Festival debut in the 2023 Closing Concert. She leads this monumental programme with the Edinburgh Festival Chorus and the BBC SSO, characterised by thrilling sounds and ideas of love, divine or human.

Bernstein & Stravinsky

Usher Hall

A concert of reflection: The titular organist of Notre-Dame de Paris, Olivier Latry, dedicates his organ recital to the memory of parish priest Christian Öhler – a long-time companion of the festival, whose commitment extended far beyond Bad Ischl.

KIRCH'KLANG: Ad memoriam II

Parish Bad Ischl

Singing has always been a priority in the Baltic states, but no other country in Europe has such a rich and diverse choral landscape as Latvia. The State Choir of Latvija, Latvia's largest professional ensemble of its kind, also comes from this environment. With unearthly sound power - from radiant soprano heights to unfathomable bass depths - this impressive ensemble not only causes a sensation in its homeland, but also regularly delights audiences in the world's major music metropolises. The Duisburg Philharmonic Orchestra considers itself lucky to be able to welcome the approximately 70 singers from Riga again this season after their visit in the 2023/2024 season. Before its performance in Arnold Schönberg's Gurre-Lieder on July 9 and 10, 2025, the State Choir of Latvija will make an a cappella stopover in the Salvatorkirche. Under the direction of Māris Sirmais, an atmospheric program will be performed, which, starting with the romantic sounds of Anton Bruckner or Edward Elgar, touches on classical modernism and, above all, presents music by contemporary Baltic composers.

special choir concert

Salvatorkirche Duisburg

"From the canyons to the stars... This means rising from the depths of the canyons up to the stars - and even higher up to the resurrected of paradise - to praise God and the abundance of his creations: the beauties of the earth (its rocks, its birdsong), the beauties of the visible sky, the beauties of the spiritual sky," writes Olivier Messiaen in the prologue to the score of "Des Canyons aux étoiles...".

Cambreling – Messiaen »Des canyons aux étoiles…«

Laeiszhalle Hamburg

"This was my first work played by an orchestra and my first contact with a large audience. I was 22 years old at the time," reports Olivier Messiaen. "Les offrandes oubliées" (The Forgotten Offerings) was composed in 1930 and premiered on February 19, 1931 in the Théâtre des Champs-Élysées by the Orchestre des concerts Straram under the direction of its boss and namesake, Walther Straram. The "symphonic meditation" (as the subtitle says) is based on linguistically comprehensible but abstract ideas. The texts were written by Messiaen himself. The themes of the three verses (cross - sin - Eucharist) can be understood as situations of contemplation, descent and rapture and form the three sections of the work.

Sylvain Cambreling, Szymon Nehring, Jane Archibald – Messiaen, Bellini, Chopin

In the popular chamber music series “Workshop.Dialogue.Music”, musicians of the Berliner Philharmoniker introducing themselves and their instruments, and talking in a relaxed atmosphere about the works presented, their interpretation and their approach. Questions and a dialogue with the audience are very welcome! A new feature is that visitors can enjoy a French breakfast from 11:00 onwards, before the concert begins at 11:30. Breakfast is included in the ticket price.

“Workshop.Dialogue.Music” Concert breakfast at the Palais Populaire

PalaisPopulaire

EXPRESS CONCERT: Cassie Pilgrim Plays Bach’s Oboe d’Amore Concerto

University of Minnesota

Shepherd of The Valley Lutheran Church

Ordway Center for the Performing Arts

Soli fan tutti - 7th Concert 24/25

Staatstheater Darmstadt

A musical matinee of superlatives: this fabulously French program was chosen by Jan Vogler together with his high-carat musical friends from France, the violinist Renaud Capuçon, the pianist Hélène Mercier and the principal clarinetist of the Orchestre de Paris, Pascal Moraguès. In 1916, Debussy, who was suffering from illness, completed his originally planned six-part cycle with his third sonata in G minor. 

Capuçon — Vogler — Moraguès — Mercier

Palais im Großen Garten

Musicians of the Concertgebouw Orchestra and Alexander Reeuwijk take you on an excursion through Beethoven’s ‘Pastorale’ and other works.

Close-up: Early birds

The Concertgebouw

»Songs are like small operas into which you can bring many colors,« says Hanna-Elisabeth Müller. Young in years, rich in success, the soprano always devotes particular attention to the programs of her song recitals.

Composer

Olivier Messiaen

Events

Upcoming events

Sep 22, 2026

Tamara Stefanovich piano · Wigmore Hall

Sep 26, 2026

Dedication to Arvo Pärt. Presentation of the anniversary CD "Spiegel im Spiegel" · Paliesius Manor

Sep 28, 2026

Lunchtime Music · Royal Birmingham Conservatoire

Sep 28, 2026

Elisabeth Brauss piano · Wigmore Hall

Oct 1, 2026

Meraki Duo · Royal Northern College of Music

Past events

Aug 8, 2026

Peter Vasks – 80 · Paliesius Manor

Aug 1, 2026

Njioma Grevious, violin & Andrew Goodridge, piano · Caramoor

About

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