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

From the ticking heart of Haydn’s Clock Symphony to the meditative echoes of Pärt’s Fratres, this program bends time and style. Featuring the luminous guitarist JIJI and guest conductor Ingrid Martin, this concert bridges centuries with elegance and edge.

EPSG:4326

Haydn's "Clock" Symphony

Detroit Country Day School - Upper School

Our Lady Star of the Sea

First United Methodist Church of Michigan

Congregation Shaarey Zedek

Thomas Larcher’s Still, originally composed in 2002, plays with the concept of the ‘video still’, a ‘frozen’ image from a video film, and the process of transforming it or leaving it unchanged. Timothy Ridout prefaces the piece as soloist in Britten’s string arrangement of his Lachrymae, leaving the Britten Sinfonia and Larcher to occupy the programme’s second half with Shaker Loops, a quintessential masterwork of American minimalism.

Britten Sinfonia With Thomas Larcher

Wigmore Hall, London

Britten Sinfonia; Timothy Ridout viola; Thomas Larcher conductor

Wigmore Hall

With "The Seven Last Words of Our Savior on the Cross," Joseph Haydn created one of his most profound and moving works. Originally composed as an orchestral arrangement for the Good Friday liturgy, the music later unfolded its haunting effect in versions for string quartet, piano, and choir. In seven slow movements, Haydn translates Jesus' last words into sounds of deep devotion, pain, and hope—a musicalmasterpiece about suffering, hope, and redemption. Or to put it another way: seven times goosebumps before the curtain falls.

Goose Flesh

Gedächtniskirche, Speyer

450 years ago, in the summer of 1576, the great Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe began construction of Uranienborg – his groundbreaking laboratory and astronomical observatory on the island of Hven. It marked the beginning of a Danish fascination with the sky and the stars that continues to this day.

Towards the stars

Trinity Church Copenhagen

Echoes of the Divine

University of California San Diego

The Great Falls Symphonic Choir presents Elements of Life—a celebration of faith, love, and the human spirit through choral works by Stroope, Bruckner, Pärt, Whitacre, Handel, Bernstein, and Ramsey. This inspiring program will be performed alongside the beautiful organ at First Congregational United Church of Christ in Great Falls in tribute to Mary Moore.

Element of Life - Symphonic Choir Concert

First Congregational United Church of Christ Great Falls

ACO Principal Violin Satu Vänskä directs ACO Collective in a program of music close to the Orchestra’s heart, including Arvo Pärt’s captivating Fratres and Brahms’ epic Sextet in G major arranged for string orchestra.

ACO Collective: Bach, Brahms & Pärt

Berninneit

ACO On The Pier

Orange Regional Museum

Riverlinks Eastbank

Wagga Wagga Civic Theatre

Lighthouse Theatre Warrnambool

Three piano concertos in a single evening – each one building a bridge to the past. Maurice Ravel composed his Piano Concerto in G “in the spirit of Mozart,” yet it also shimmers with hints of jazz and Basque folk music. In Credo, Arvo Pärt draws on the famous C major Prelude from Johann Sebastian Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier, juxtaposing familiar tonality with avant-garde techniques. And György Kurtág – who celebrated his 100th birthday in February 2026 – looks back to the free associations of Ludwig van Beethoven’s Op. 27 piano sonatas in his mesmerizing spatial work … quasi una fantasia …, which positions the instruments all around the audience. These three strikingly different concertos are set alongside America – A Prophecy, a dark, apocalyptic vision by the British composer Thomas Adès, who conducts the performance himself. The work confronts the destruction of Mayan culture by the Spanish conquistadors, with a soprano cast in the role of a warning seer. And at the very start of the concert,  in György Ligeti’s Poème Symphonique, 100 metronomes will begin ticking at the same time. One by one, they gradually fall silent. When the last metronome stops, says Víkingur Ólafsson, it feels “like the end of life.”

Mahler Chamber Orchestra | MDR Radio Choir | Thomas Adès | Víkingur Ólafsson | Anna Dennis

KKL Luzern Concert Hall

Join us as the Aarhus Symphony Orchestra offers a festive preview of some of the upcoming season's musical highlights. Look forward to a potpourri of exuberant excerpts and movements, presented in an inviting format that whets the appetite for all that awaits.

Preview: Season 26/27

Aarhus Music Hall

Bach - Britten - Pärt - MacMillan: On the "Day of Liberation" on May 8th, we musically bridge to Great Britain with our Philharmonic Choirs and present a program that illuminates different musical approaches to themes such as peace, remembrance, and spirituality. In his "Sinfonia da Requiem," Benjamin Britten combines liturgical elements with his personal musical language. Created against the backdrop of World War II, the composition stands as a monument and plea for peace and humanity. Arvo Pärt's "Da pacem Domine" combines meditative calmness and a clear, simple aesthetic. Pärt's minimalist musical language elevates the Latin plea for peace into a timeless, universal dimension. However, the musical core of the concert consists of two works by our Composer in Residence, who also conducts. Particularly poignant are his "Cantos Sagrados." "When composing this piece, I wanted to create something that is both timeless and contemporary, both sacred and secular," he says. The result is a moving work for choir and orchestra that is particularly touching under his direction.

MacMillan and Choir

Palace of Culture

Gold Medalist of the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition in 2013 and a Fort Worth favorite, Vadym Kholodenko’s distinguished pianism and profound artistic gifts have led to invitations from many of the world’s finest orchestras and concert halls. Combining fierce pianism, an unrivalled breadth of repertoire, and a level of interpretative refinement that ascends to the realms of poetry, Mr. Kholodenko rises as an artist the likes of which the world has rarely seen since the great pianists of the Golden Age. He has forged strong musical partnerships with many leading conductors and has appeared on the world’s leading stages — from London, Paris, and Vienna to Boston, Chicago, and New York — where he is praised for his “iron-clad technique, capable of moments of crystalline delicacy” (The Guardian).

Subtle Connections Across the World - Vadym Kholodenko and Friends

Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth

In May, ERSO welcomes conductor Dennis Russell Davies and pianist Maki Namekawa to the stage. With a distinguished career spanning over five decades, Davies has led some of the world’s most acclaimed orchestras, festivals, and opera houses. A long-time interpreter of Arvo Pärt’s music, Davies will conduct the composer’s Symphony No. 4 Los Angeles. Maki Namekawa, known for her dedication to contemporary music, will perform Philip Glass’s Mishima Piano Concerto, inspired by the score for Paul Schrader’s film Mishima: A Life in Four Chapters.

Pärt and Glass. Dennis Russell Davies

Estonia Concert Hall

Austin Talbot, trombone

Northwestern Bienen School of Music

Peabody Hopkins Conservatory Choir

Emmanuel Episcopal Church in Baltimore 

Even "birdsong and an orange sunrise" can be found in his "Siegfried Idyll," explained Richard Wagner. The work for chamber orchestra was a birthday surprise for his wife Cosima and was first performed in 1870 in the stairwell of their home in Tribschen near Lucerne. The title alludes to their son Siegfried, but Wagner primarily quotes from the musical drama of the same name in his four-part opera "The Ring of the Nibelung."

Day And Night

Zeughaus Neuss

The Amarillo Symphony and Amarillo Master Chorale join forces for an unforgettable evening of choral masterpieces featuring Arvo Pärt’s ethereal Da Pacem Domine and Brahms’s deeply moving Requiem. This concert promises a journey of profound musical beauty and emotion.

Brahms Requiem

Globe-News Center for the Performing Arts

The exquisite singers of the Tallis Scholars visit with an Easter season program featuring works inspired by miraculous events in the biblical story of Jesus’ life.

The Tallis Scholars

First Congregational Church of Berkeley

"I want to nourish the soul," said Latvian composer Pēteris Vasks, whose birthday the Munich Radio Orchestra is celebrating with works as diverse as a mass and the violin concerto "Distant Light." These works shed light on Vasks's thinking—the coexistence of nature and humanity, the sense of beauty, and the impending moral destruction of the world. His themes are rooted in his upbringing, having grown up in a country that was able to cast off its shackles nonviolently in a "Singing Revolution."

Peteris Vasks

Sacred Heart Church Munich

Arvo Pärt / Passion

Philharmonie de Paris

Anton Bruckner spoke to the conductor Arthur Nikisch about divine visions – perhaps this is a key to understanding his mystical choral motets? Estonian composer Arvo Pärt is also no stranger to periods of retreat and inner contemplation. Both composers transport their listeners to another world. In this program, their music will be combined with probably the best-known organ work of all time: Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor.

Soundscapes

Stiftskirche

The programme begins with Gabrieli and Victoria’s Missa O magnum mysterium, which depicts Christ’s birth. Other pieces explore miracles, such as Egressus Jesus, recounting Christ exorcising a demon, and Weir’s Ave Regina Caelorum, which reflects on the mystery of the Virgin birth.

The Tallis Scholars: Mysteries & Miracles

Milton Court Concert Hall

Hans Sachs Choir Nuremberg

Meistersinger Hall

Silvestrov’s Quiet Music sets a calm and reflective tone with gentle melodies that take listeners on a meditative journey, away from the noise of everyday life.

Northern Lights

Lesher Center for the Arts

Conducted by Donato Cabrera, California Symphony performs at the Lesher Center, featuring California Symphony Concertmaster Jenny Cho and Assistant Concertmaster Sam Weiser.

Joanne Pearce Martin and Jin-Shan Dai

Los Angeles Harbor College

Pacific Unitarian Church

Beauty, passion and the miracles of nature – there’s no tale that an orchestra can’t tell, and there’s definitely no symphony quite like Tchaikovsky’s shattering Fourth. Raw tragedy, roof-raising triumph: it’s explosive stuff, so guest conductor Kristiina Poska begins with something a little more tranquil. Arvo Pärt’s haunting Cantus is the perfect complement to a wonderful new set of songs from Elena Langer, inspired by the songs of birds and the nature poetry of Glyn Maxwell. Experience musical history in the making.

Tchaikovsky’s Fourth Symphony

Usher Hall

Beauty, passion and the miracles of nature – there’s no tale that an orchestra can’t tell, and there’s definitely no symphony quite like Tchaikovsky’s shattering Fourth. Raw tragedy, roof-raising triumph: it’s explosive stuff, so guest conductor Kristiina Poska begins with something a little more tranquil. Arvo Pärt’s haunting Cantus is the perfect complement to a wonderful new set of songs from Elena Langer, inspired by the songs of birds and the nature poetry of Glyn Maxwell. Experience musical history in the making. 

Glasgow Royal Concert Hall

Caird Hall

Usher Hall, Edinburgh

Destined to be one of the great choral events of the decade, the world-renowned Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir (EPCC), led by esteemed founder and conductor Tõnu Kaljuste, returns to Toronto for a tribute to Arvo Pärt’s 90th birthday. A favourite of Toronto audiences, the EPCC has captivated listeners under Soundstreams’ auspices since 2000, with concerts that regularly sell out. Don’t miss this rare opportunity to experience their luminous sound in the acoustic splendor of Yorkminster Park Baptist Church. The program features some of Pärt’s most celebrated works, alongside works by Philip Glass, Evelin Seppar, Luciano Berio, and others. It also includes the world premiere of a new Soundstreams commission by Estonian-Canadian composer Riho Esko Maimets — adding a special local touch to this celebration of the legendary Estonian composer.

Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir: Arvo Pärt at 90

Yorkminster Park Baptist Church

The internationally acclaimed Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir, under the direction of Tõnu Kaljuste, celebrates the famed Estonian composer Arvo Pärt and the indelible mark he has left on choral singing and classical music over his 90 years. As a composer, Pärt has changed the course of music — both within and beyond the classical sphere. Profound, powerful, and beloved worldwide, his work transcends time and space, taking us beyond everyday existence into another realm.

Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir

University of Michigan

Italy in the 18th Century – Chamber Music Concert #1

Stadtmuseum Pforzheim

Among them, parallel trajectories echo each other with poignant force. Korngold and Schoenberg, two major figures in Viennese music, had to flee Nazism. The former found refuge in Hollywood where he revolutionized film music; the latter reconstructed his musical language in the United States. Their works bear the scars of this uprooting, between nostalgia and audacity. Pablo Casals and Roberto Gerhard, Spanish exiles, embody resistance through music. Casals, an opponent of Franco, transformed El cant dels ocells into a hymn of freedom. Gerhard, a disciple of Schoenberg, blended avant-garde and Catalan folklore in a unique style, shaped by his exile in England. Arvo Pärt, Olga Podgaiskaya, and Samir Odeh-Tamimi extend this reflection on wandering and creation. Pärt, forced to leave Soviet Estonia, found refuge in timeless music. Podgaiskaya and Odeh-Tamimi, heirs to these journeys, in turn question boundaries and shifting identities. An evening resonating with the echoes of a torn 20th century and the persistence of a beauty born of absence. A world concert where each note echoes a lost land, but also the hope of a new beginning.

Exiles #2

Opéra Comédie

Visit to the Vesperkirche: Italy in the 18th century – Chamber music concert

Pforzheim Town Church (Evangelical)

Mozart died at the age of 35 before he was able to complete his masterful Requiem. Maestro Gomez has conceived a “completion” by commissioning Tucson composer Dan Coleman to compose a work connecting the Requiem to Mozart’s choral gem Ave verum corpus. The quartet of soloists joining the TSO Chorus includes the return of Angela Brower for the second of two weeks.

Mozart’s Requiem

Catalina Foothills High School

Iveta Apkalna: The Queen of Instruments

Mozarteum Foundation

His music is clear yet rich in nuances: This is what makes the works of the year's ruler, Benjamin Britten (1913–1976), so incomparable. The Estonian composer Arvo Pärt honored his English colleague, whom he never met in person, with a cantus. Britten himself explored nocturnal spheres in his Serenade and the later Nocturne. The tenor and horn are the outstanding players on this journey through darkness and dream. Sergei Prokofiev's Symphonie classique, sparkling with virtuosity, takes us back to the light of day: a classical hit in the best sense!

A Tribute to Benjamin Britten

Prinzregententheater

The Belgian National Orchestra celebrates rhythms and percussion. Gershwin's only opera, Porgy and Bess , distills the essence of jazz and contains timeless tunes like Summertime . With Body Language (2012), Julia Wolfe highlights Colin Currie's physical and musical talent, transforming his body into a veritable instrument to fuse the sounds of urban folk music with those of the orchestra. Andriessen's Tapdance (2013), also written for Currie, magnifies the sound of tap dancing and the memory of big bands. As for Arvo Pärt's Fratres , characteristic of the Estonian composer's ethereal and meditative style, it offers a suspended moment imbued with spirituality.

Porgy & Bess

Philharmonic Hall of Liege

Eva Ollikainen and acclaimed pianist Mao Fujita bring the full range of emotion to Brahms’s stormy Piano Concerto No. 1, followed by Stravinsky’s The Firebird, a spellbinding work that bursts with vivid orchestral colours, transporting listeners to a fantastical realm of daring heroes, enchanted princesses, and otherworldly magic.

The Firebird

David Pecaut Square

Start the new year with an enchanting program featuring Corelli’s Christmas Concerto, Ralph Vaughan-Williams’s exquisite Oboe Concerto, and serene works by Pärt and Foote.

Serenading the High Plains

Amarillo Botanical Gardens

In early January, the focus of “Audiospaa” series will be on ERSO’s cello section, joined on stage by the renowned vocal ensemble Vox Clamantis. The programme, curated by ERSO cello principal Theodor Sink, creates a compelling dialogue between the works of Arvo Pärt and Philip Glass. Glass’s minimalist sound world is represented by Façades, Secret Agent, and Attack and Fall, while Pärt’s meditative pieces include Missa brevis, Silouan’s Song, and L’abbé Agathon. The evening concludes with Hanging D, a reflective work by Dutch composer and pianist Joep Beving. The concert is conducted by Kaspar Mänd.

Eight Cellos and Vox Clamantis. Pärt and Glass

New Year's Eve Concert I

Church of St. Nicholas

Pierre-Laurent Aimard, one of today's most important pianists, will grace the Rudolfinum with his brilliant playing and a unique recital. He will perform Ravel's Concerto for Piano and Orchestra in G Major, inspired by jazz and Basque folk music. Ravel's models for his composition also included the composers Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Camille Saint-Saëns.

Petr Popelka and Pierre-Laurent Aimard

Rudolfinum

Before the Christmas holidays, the Estonian National Symphony Orchestra will be on a concert tour in Southern Europe, celebrating the orchestra’s 99th anniversary. The tour program opens with Arvo Pärt’s evergreen Cantus in Memory of Benjamin Britten, which has become an inseparable companion to ERSO’s concert tours. The evenings continue with the works of Finland’s national treasure, Jean Sibelius. Performed by Dutch violinist Simone Lamsma, the program includes one of the greatest challenges in the violin repertoire: Sibelius’s Violin Concerto. In the second half of the evening, the composer’s Second Symphony will be performed. Written in Rapallo, a mountainous town on the Gulf of Venice, the work is infused with the light of Southern Europe.

ERSO

Festspielhaus Bregenz

Cankarjev dom

This December, ERSO prepares to embark on a concert tour of Southern Europe to mark the Orchestra’s 99th birthday. Before the tour, a celebratory concert will take place in Tallinn, opening with Arvo Pärt’s timeless Cantus in Memory of Benjamin Britten. The spotlight of the evening will be on the music of Jean Sibelius. Renowned Dutch violinist Simone Lamsma will perform the composer’s Violin Concerto—a cornerstone of the violin repertoire known for its emotional depth and technical brilliance. The program concludes with Sibelius’s Symphony No. 2, composed in the Italian town of Rapallo. The influence of southern Italian light and landscape is unmistakably woven into the fabric of this majestic symphonic work.

Elts and Lamsma. Sibelius

A lunch break that invigorates the mind. The Thursday lunch concerts will bring audiences the best selection of the Friday night programme.

Symphonic Lunch III: Elts and Lamsma. Sibelius

Enjoy festive music from Mexico, Ukraine, Canada, South Africa, Estonia, as well as traditional Celtic favourites, in a kaleidoscopic programme showcasing the rich tapestry of global Christmas music.

Christmas Around the World

Smith Square Hall

With the death of Benjamin Britten on December 4, 1976, the music world lost one of the most important composers of the 20th century. Only shortly before his passing had the Estonian composer Arvo Pärt gained "an impression of the rare purity of his music." Overwhelmed by the "magnitude of such a loss," Pärt wrote his Cantus in Memory of Benjamin Britten in 1977 as a homage to the deceased artist, but also as a meditation on death. The bell tone at the end of the six-minute work fades into a tense silence, out of which the opening bars of Mozart's Requiem emerge. It remained unfinished after his death on December 5, 1791, thus making him a myth. Mozart: lux æterna.

Mozart Requiem on Mozart's death anniversary

Woven around well known Pärt pieces such as Fur Alina and Fratres, new works by DJ and producer Koreless, producer and composer Floating Points, British composer and violinist Sasha Scott and composer and cellist Oliver Coates will cast a new light on Pärt’s works, while demonstrating his considerable influence on composers today.

12 Ensemble / GBSR Duo x Koreless: Pärt Refracted

LSO St Luke's

Ashley Hall-Tighe is an internationally acclaimed trumpeter known for her warm tone, expressive artistry, and dynamic performances on stages from the Sydney Opera House to Beijing’s NCPA. A former touring member of Canadian Brass, she is a sought-after soloist, chamber musician, and educator.

Masterworks: Italian Impressions

Lenoir-Rhyne University

Fall 2025 Concert

Calvary Presbyterian Church

On the 21 November 1975, a group of pioneering musicians walked out onto the Sydney Opera House Concert Hall stage and the Australian Chamber Orchestra was born. Founded by the legendary Australian cellist John Painter, these musicians were driven by a shared mission to take control of their musical destinies: to become the country’s first truly national orchestra with an uncompromising commitment to elite performance, to represent Australia on the world stage, and provide opportunities to the country’s brightest young string players.

Celebrating the Australian Chamber Orchestra

Sydney Opera House

For the fifth time in its 45-year history, and for the first time in two decades, The Sixteen will travel to Japan for four performances across the country, celebrating Palestrina’s 500th anniversary and the 90th birthday of Arvo Pärt. In a programme demonstrating the craft of choral writing across the centuries, we combine music from Palestrina’s exquisite Song of Songs and Stabat mater, with the mesmerising sounds of Pärt’s Tribute to Ceasar and Da pacem Domine.

The Celebrated Light of Music

Acros Fukuoka

Aoyama Music Memorial Hall Barocksaal

Sagamihara Civic Center

Tokyo Opera City Tower

Alongside Pärt’s music, they present two deeply expressive works by Estonian composer Galina Grigorjeva, whose choral writing evokes rich sonorities and emotional depth. The program also premieres new works by Evelin Seppar, written especially for the ensemble.

The Carice Singers: Infinity Flow

St Giles Cripplegate

Chamber Concert Early successes

Munich Residence

Evangelische Akademie

Chamber Concert "Early successes"

The atmospheric and deeply spiritual music of Arvo Pärt has made him one of the world’s most performed and beloved composers. Alfred Schnittke, meanwhile, saw himself as a musical link to Mozart, Schubert, Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninov. This concert features works by both composers – music rich in emotional intensity. Arvo Pärt turns 90 this year (on 11 September).

Arvo Pärt and Alfred Schnittke

Konserthuset Stockholm

Just in time for the spookiest time of year, Dracula is a captivating adaptation of Bram Stoker’s classic Gothic novel, brought to life through two time Tony Award nominated Lynne Taylor-Corbett's mesmerizing choreography and haunting music performed live under the baton of Lorenzo Lopez. Paired with Taylor-Corbett's Code of Silence, you don't want to miss these shows in tribute to the late choreographer.

Dracula & Code of Silence

Mimi Ohio Theatre

The AFEKT Festival celebrates the 90th birthdays of living legend Arvo Pärt and Helmut Lachenmann. To mark the occasion, audiences will have a rare opportunity to hear maestro Lachenmann’s work …zwei Gefühle…. The soloist in Jüri Reinvere’s flute concerto is Monika Mattiesen, the festival’s artistic director. The concert will be conducted by Susanne Blumenthal, a highly acclaimed interpreter of contemporary music.

International Contemporary Music Festival AFEKT. Zwei Gefühle

Experience the Carnegie season’s first performance by the intrepid chamber orchestra The Knights, led by artistic directors Eric Jacobsen and Colin Jacobsen. In an inspired new collaboration, they intersperse Philip Glass’s Symphony No. 3—one of the composer’s most traditionally “classical” works—with original poetry by prizewinning poet and multidisciplinary artist J. Mae Barizo. Even in its original form, this would be Carnegie Hall’s first performance of Glass’s symphony—but in the hands of The Knights, it’s something no audience has heard before. In the program’s second half, The Knights perform a timeless orchestral staple: Robert Schumann’s Symphony No. 4, a work of complex dualities and grand Romanticism.

The Knights at Carnegie Hall

Carnegie Hall

The Estonian composer Arvo Pärt acts as a pivot within music history. On the one hand, he is one of the most successful composers of so-called New Music, even though he quickly distanced himself aesthetically from the experiments of the post-war avant-garde. On the other hand, medieval Gregorian chant – "music with soul, without harmony or meter," as he once said – served as his greatest source of inspiration. In this respect, it seems only logical that the celebrated British choir Tenebrae has now designed a program that presents Pärt's music in the context of composers from the Middle Ages and the present.

Darkness / George Herbert / Nigel Short

Elbphilharmonie Hamburg

Estonian conductor Paavo Järvi hardly needs an introduction in Hamburg. He gives numerous concerts here every year with the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen, of which he has been Artistic Director since 2004, and as Music Director of the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich. Since 2011, Järvi has established another musical pillar with the Pärnu Music Festival, which he founded himself. The reputation of the festival and its resident ensemble – the Estonian Festival Orchestra – now extends far beyond the Baltics. Now he is returning with the ensemble and a program dedicated exclusively to the music of Järvi's famous compatriot Arvo Pärt, marking the 90th birthday of his son.

Estonian Festival Orchestra / Hans Christian Aavik / Midori / Paavo Järvi

The Belfast Philharmonic Choir open their 2025/26 season with a powerful evening of reflection, light, and remembrance in the stunning Gothic Revival setting of St Peter’s Cathedral.

Belfast Philharmonic Choir: All Souls Concert

St Peter's Cathedral

Seven times this season, members of the Mainz Philharmonic State Orchestra and guests will perform Sunday matinees in the foyer of the Grand Hall. Here, various ensembles cultivate the rich genre of chamber music and present works of their own choosing – from great classics to rare chamber music works.

Sunday matinee in October

Staatstheater Mainz

From the quiet lyricism of Grieg’s Elegiac Melodies to the haunting grace of Sibelius’s Valse triste, this program traces an emotional journey across Northern Europe and its diaspora. Arvo Pärt’s fearless First Symphony meets the deeply personal voice of Estonian-American composer Lembit Beecher, whose Tell Me Again—featuring acclaimed cellist Karen Ouzounian (Silk Road Ensemble, the Knights)—meditates on memory, identity, and the echoes of family stories.

Ithaca College

Founded in 1981 by Tõnu Kaljuste, the Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir (EPCC) is now one of the most renowned chamber choirs in Europe. Even though the Estonian conductor stepped down from his leadership of the choir after 20 successful years, he still enjoys returning to the ensemble. Kaljuste and the EPCC are considered absolute authorities, particularly for the works of their famous compatriot Arvo Pärt, who celebrates his 90th birthday this year – in 2014, they even won a Grammy for their recording of Pärt's "Adam's Lament." They now return to the Elbphilharmonie with this very work, accompanied by the Hamburg Ensemble Resonanz.

Ensemble Resonanz / Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir / Tõnu Kaljuste

In the second of three concerts celebrating the composer's 90th birthday, some of Arvo Pärt’s best known works including Cantus in Memoriam Benjamin Britten, L’Abbé Agathon, Fratres and Te Deum are heard alongside Estonian 20th century composer Ester Mägi’s Vesper for string orchestra.

Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir: Adam's Lament

Barbican Centre

Music heals and reconciles

Church of Saint Agnes of Bohemia

Music and meditation have long gone hand in hand – in everything from yoga studios to mindfulness apps. The pianist and neuropsychologist Nicolas Namoradze goes one step further by introducing meditation techniques to the concert hall. Arvo Pärt’s deeply introspective music provides the ideal backdrop, creating an entirely new listening experience with guided meditation and flexible seating – whether on chairs, beanbags, or (your own) yoga mat.

Deep Listening

Elbphilharmonie

Iveta Apkalna, titular organist of the Elbphilharmonie, opens the organ season with works by Johann Sebastian Bach and Arvo Pärt, who celebrates his 90th birthday this year. In their faith and deep spirituality, the composers, both great organ masters, are kindred spirits.

Iveta Apkalna, organ

The Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir and Concerto Copenhagen explore new soundscapes in Arvo Pärt's music.

 

You know Arvo Pärt's music, but perhaps without knowing it. The world-renowned composer from Estonia has made a name for himself with his simple, spherical and meditative musical language, which can be heard in countless documentaries and feature films. His choral music in particular is famous throughout the world, not least in Denmark, where the choral tradition is as strong as in the Baltic countries.

Composer

Arvo Pärt

Events

Upcoming events

Aug 17, 2026

Musica Viva Australia presents Nicolas Altstaedt & Thomas Dunford · Queensland Conservatorium Griffith University

Aug 28, 2026

Gaia x BBC Concert Orchestra: Sounds of the Earth · Southbank Centre

Sep 26, 2026

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

Oct 17, 2026

A Turning Leaf · Sinfonia Smith Square

Nov 2, 2026

War Requiem · Prague Radio Symphony Orchestra

Past events

Aug 8, 2026

Peter Vasks – 80 · Paliesius Manor

23 - 26 Jul, 2026

Haydn's "Clock" Symphony · Detroit Symphony Orchestra

About

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