NEW YORK, NY.- The Metropolitan Operas gamble on contemporary work continues. Celebrations of big anniversaries for two musical innovators, Charles Ives and Pierre Boulez, are worth seeking out. And Carnegie Hall will host world-class orchestras. But dont expect Gustavo Dudamel, the New York Philharmonics next music director, to be a fixture yet; until 2026, he is dedicated to the Los Angeles Philharmonic, which opens Carnegies season with a three-night residency. Here are highlights from this falls performance calendar. (Locations are in Manhattan unless otherwise specified; dates are subject to change.)
SEPTEMBER
ATLANTA OPERA: Not quite 50 years old, this company is bucking the belt-tightening, season-shrinking trend in American opera. It is presenting La Bohème (updated to the COVID-19 pandemic) and Rent, the Broadway musical that transplanted Puccinis classic to the AIDS era, both staged by Tomer Zvulun, its artistic director, and Vita Tzykun. (Sept. 18-Oct. 6; Pullman Yards, Atlanta)
INDRAS NET: How about a hopeful perspective on our divided times? The invaluable Meredith Monk created and will perform in Indras Net, the conclusion to a trilogy of works about our relationship with the natural world and inspired by Buddhist and Hindu legends. (Sept. 23-Oct. 6; Park Avenue Armory)
THE LISTENERS: Missy Mazzoli, who is working on an operatic adaptation of George Saunders Lincoln in the Bardo, first brings another work with literary inspiration to Opera Philadelphia: The Listeners, with a libretto by Royce Vavrek, based on Jordan Tannahills unsettling novel about the search for meaning and a cultish leader who claims to have answers. (Sept. 25-29; Academy of Music, Philadelphia)
OCTOBER
LOS ANGELES PHILHARMONIC: Gustavo Dudamel will be at the podium for three nights to start Carnegie Halls season: with Lang Lang in Rachmaninoffs Second piano concerto; with Alisa Weilerstein in a new cello concerto by Gabriela Ortiz; and with Mexican singer-songwriter Natalia Lafourcade. (Oct. 8-10; Carnegie Hall)
BOULEZ CENTENNIAL: The New York Philharmonic doesnt often celebrate Pierre Boulez, the eminent modernist composer and conductor who was its music director from 1971 to 77. But in honor of Boulezs 100th birthday next March, Philharmonic musicians will join students from the Juilliard School in Schoenbergs sprightly Op. 29 Suite and Boulezs riotously colored Sur Incises. David Robertson, who led that works 1998 premiere, conducts. (Oct. 9; Peter Jay Sharp Theater)
MATTHIAS PINTSCHER: This conductor begins his tenure as music director of the Kansas City Symphony in September, and returns to the podium of the New York Philharmonic soon afterward as a guest. In New York, he will lead the United States premiere of his Neharot, as well as Mendelssohns Violin Concerto (with the ever-genial Gil Shaham) and Schoenbergs Pelleas und Melisande. (Oct. 10 and 13; David Geffen Hall)
DALLAS SYMPHONY ORCHESTRA: It takes a burst of resources for an orchestra to perform just one of Wagners four Ring operas let alone a full cycle over the course of just a week. But Fabio Luisi, Dallas music director, is an experienced opera conductor, making this ambitious project, featuring sopranos Lise Lindstrom and Sara Jakubiak, worth traveling for. (Oct. 13-20; Meyerson Symphony Center, Dallas)
AINADAMAR: Two decades after the premiere of Osvaldo Golijovs Lorca-inspired first opera, with a libretto by David Henry Hwang, it arrives at the Metropolitan Opera. The sumptuous mezzo-soprano Daniela Mack sings the role of Federico García Lorca, while sopranos Angel Blue and Gabriella Reyes share the role of his muse, Margarita Xirgu. Conductor Miguel Harth-Bedoya makes his company debut in the pit. (Oct. 15-Nov. 9; Metropolitan Opera)
EXPLORING AFROMODERNISM: The New York Philharmonics mini-festival celebrating compositions from the African diaspora includes a Young Peoples Concert and a performance by the International Contemporary Ensemble. But the week focuses on a program conducted by Thomas Wilkins and featuring a new work for cello and orchestra by Nathalie Joachim; Seth Parker Woods is the soloist. There will also be music by Carlos Simon, David Baker and William Grant Still. (Oct. 17-18; David Geffen Hall)
92NY: In recent years, the 92nd Street Y has quietly become one of the most ambitious and intriguing music presenters in New York. After the Australian Chamber Orchestra opens the season with Vivaldis Four Seasons in the context of works inspired by the Ottoman Empire, new music comes from the likes of the JACK Quartet (Nov. 10) alongside stalwarts including the pianist Angela Hewitt (Oct. 30) and the Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin (Dec. 3).
LISETTE OROPESA: It may seem strange, but soprano Lisette Oropesa, a well-traveled, bona fide opera star, is only now making her recital debut at Carnegie Hall. With pianist Ken Noda, she will perform works by recognizable composers, but also ones from Cuba, where her parents were born, including Jorge Anckermann, Gonzalo Roig and Eduardo Sánchez de Fuentes. Her debut comes the day after another notable one: violinist María Dueñas. (Oct. 23; Zankel Hall)
CHARLES IVES AT 150: Pity Charles Ives, an American innovator who is barely being celebrated in New York for the 150th anniversary of his birth. Among artists modestly observing the occasion are the Momenta Quartet playing A Set of Three Short Pieces (Oct. 24, Americas Society) and pianist Jeremy Denk performing the Concord Sonata (Dec. 12, 92NY).
PAUL LEWIS: Few surveys of Schuberts piano sonatas warrant as much attention as that of Paul Lewis, an elegant and intelligent interpreter of this composers keyboard music. Lewiss sonata programs, part of the inexpensively priced Peoples Symphony Concerts series, began last season and conclude with two evenings. Especially noteworthy is the second, with the final three sonatas, including the shattering 21st in B flat (D. 960). (Oct. 27 at the Town Hall; Nov. 16 at Washington Irving High School)
NOVEMBER
IGOR LEVIT AND THE CLEVELAND ORCHESTRA: Its difficult to imagine a more promising pair than Igor Levit, one of our greatest living pianists, and the Cleveland Orchestra, the finest ensemble in America. Under the wise baton of Franz Welser-Möst, they will perform a cycle of Beethovens piano concertos, as well as his Triple Concerto, with violinist Augustin Hadelich and cellist Julia Hagen. (Nov. 6-17; Severance Music Center, Cleveland)
CHAMBER MUSIC SOCIETY OF LINCOLN CENTER: This venerable organization has found a healthy audience for polished performances of the classics. Among the societys fall highlights is the sensitive, ardent tenor Matthew Polenzanis first performance of Schuberts song cycle Schwanengesang, on a program that also includes Robert Schumanns Piano Quintet, a work that sweeps from expansive lyricism to energetic intensity. (Nov. 9; Alice Tully Hall)
MIGUEL ZENÓN: The Miller Theaters Composer Portraits series continues with an evening dedicated to Miguel Zenón, a composer and saxophonist with an open-ear approach to music. Only one work will be on the program: the New York premiere of Golden City, a full-length, multimedia tribute to the immigrants of San Francisco. (The series continues with focuses on Lisa Streich, Miya Masaoka and Jessie Montgomery.) (Nov. 14; Miller Theater)
ARIADNE UNBOUND: The best-known adaptation of the myth of Ariadne, abandoned by Theseus on the island of Naxos, is an opera by Richard Strauss. But the superb early-music ensemble Tenet tells the story through a new pastiche of repurposed 17th-century Italian pieces by Francesca Caccini, Sigismondo DIndia, Barbara Strozzi and Claudio Monteverdi, featuring a cast of six. (Nov. 16; Park Avenue Christian Church)
BERLIN PHILHARMONIC: This orchestra and its chief conductor, Kirill Petrenko, offer a master class in passion and stupefying technique. After giving Korngolds only symphony a rare outing in 2022, theyll play his better-known Violin Concerto with Hilary Hahn, as well as Rachmaninoffs brooding Isle of the Dead, Dvoraks Seventh Symphony and, for Bruckners 200th birthday, his grandly sprawling Fifth, a rare foray into his music for Petrenko. (Nov. 17-19; Carnegie Hall)
SUN DOGS: Its programming vastly curtailed in recent years, the Brooklyn Academy of Music now has few events focused on, well, music. But its cinema offerings are still first-rate, and will be drawn on for this project, which sets short films by Apichatpong Weerasethakul, Mati Diop and Manon Lutanie, and Josephine Decker to new scores by Rafiq Bhatia, Devonté Hynes, and Arooj Aftab and Daniel Wohl, performed live by Alarm Will Sound, the veteran contemporary music ensemble. (Nov. 18-19; Howard Gilman Opera House, Brooklyn Academy of Music)
TOUCH TRACE: Zosha Di Castri, an exhilaratingly inventive composer, has written a new piece that explores the nature of touch: the tactile nature of performance, collaboration and interaction between artist and audience. Members of the International Contemporary Ensemble will perform the premiere, conducted by Steven Schick. (Nov. 21; Roulette, Brooklyn)
ROYAL CONCERTGEBOUW ORCHESTRA: The starry young conductor Klaus Mäkelä performs best with a top-notch ensemble like this one, which he will take over in 2027. In a pair of concerts, he will lead symphonies by Mahler and Rachmaninoff, as well as the United States premiere of a new work by Ellen Reid and a Prokofiev concerto, with the excellent violinist Lisa Batiashvili. (Nov. 22 and 23; Carnegie Hall)
DIE FRAU OHNE SCHATTEN: Yannick Nézet-Séguin, the Metropolitan Operas music director, leads one of the repertorys grandest orchestral showpieces: Richard Strauss and Hugo von Hofmannsthals portentous yet stirring parable of love and marriage. Elza van den Heever, Lise Lindstrom, Nina Stemme, Michael Volle, Russell Thomas and Ryan Speedo Green take on some of operas most daunting roles; Herbert Wernickes stunning hall-of-mirrors staging hasnt been revived at the Met since 2013. (Nov. 29-Dec. 19; Metropolitan Opera)
DECEMBER
FOCUS ON CZECH MUSIC: For those of us who adore Czech music, this week of bounty from idiomatic interpreters at Carnegie Hall is sure to be a season highlight. In three concerts under Semyon Bychkov, the Czech Philharmonic offers star soloists like Yo-Yo Ma and Daniil Trifonov in works by Dvorak, Smetana and Janacek (a rare performance of his Glagolitic Mass); the Prague Philharmonic Choir and Pavel Haas Quartet follow. But where is opera? (Dec. 3-7; Carnegie Hall)
JANINE JANSEN AND DENIS KOZHUKHIN: Janine Jansen, an elegant and radiantly modest Dutch violinist, has long been troubled by injuries, and her career centers on Europe, so her New York appearances should be treasured including this recital, her first at Carnegie since 2018. Joined by pianist Denis Kozhukhin, she will play works by Brahms and Clara and Robert Schumann. On March 5, Jansen will also join the London Symphony Orchestra and Antonio Pappano at Carnegie for Bernsteins Serenade (After Platos Symposium). (Dec. 10; Carnegie Hall)
MESSIAH: Among the bevy of renditions of Handels oratorio every December in New York, one is unrivaled: Trinity Churchs scorching version, led this year by Jane Glover (Dec. 11-13). But if thats sold out, there are many other options, including the Dessoff Choirs singalong performance (Dec. 6, Union Theological Seminary), the New York Philharmonic and Musica Sacra under Ton Koopman (Dec. 11-14, David Geffen Hall) and the Oratorio Society of New York under Kent Tritle (Dec. 23, Carnegie Hall).
AIDA: After over 30 years, the Metropolitan Opera replaces its grandly old-fashioned production of this Verdi classic with a new one by Michael Mayer, a Broadway director who has yet to stage an opera persuasively at the Met. The opening-night cast includes Angel Blue in the title role, as well as Judit Kutasi as Amneris and Piotr Beczala as Radamès; Yannick Nézet-Séguin conducts. (Dec. 31-May 9; Metropolitan Opera)
This article originally appeared in
The New York Times.