April 7: Kaufman Music Center & New York Festival of Song Present Poulenc/Sondheim

Celebrating Two 20th Century Composers of Wit and Originality
Featuring Soprano Christine Price and Baritone Theo Hoffman
With Pianists and NYFOS Curators Steven Blier and Bénédicte Jourdois 

Tuesday, April 7, 2026 at 8:00pm 
Merkin Hall at Kaufman Music Center | New York, NY 

“Everything that a song recital can achieve, in terms of musical revelation, vocal excellence and audience engagement, was exemplified… [in] the New York Festival of Song's Fugitives.”
– The Washington Post

“A NYFOS concert is always a revelation and a joy to experience.” – Opera News

www.nyfos.org 

New York, NY (March 12, 2026) – On April 7, 2026 at 8:00pm, New York Festival of Song (NYFOS) presents Poulenc/Sondheim, a celebration of two of the 20th century’s inimitable composers, at Kaufman Music Center’s Merkin Hall. Both masters of irony, musical wit, urban sophistication, and psychological acumen, Francis Poulenc and Stephen Sondheim go head to head in a concert of kinship and contrast, with Poulenc’s sensuality becoming the perfect foil for Sondheim’s lightning wordplay. Soprano Christine Taylor Price and baritone Theo Hoffman will be featured alongside pianists and curators Steven Blier, Artistic Director of NYFOS, and Bénédicte Jourdois, Associate Artistic Director of NYFOS.

All ticket holders are invited to a complimentary post-concert reception with the artists.

“Francis Poulenc’s songs conjure up the essence of Paris—raffish, sensual, contemplative; Stephen Sondheim evokes the sass and complexity of New York with the precision of a master,” Blier commented. “The two fit together like puzzle pieces, each taking up thoughts and feelings where the other one left off. It’s a perfect project for the delightfully Parisian Bénédicte Jourdois and me (a dyed-in-the-wool Manhattanite) to work on together. The songs are stunning, and the Poulenc-Sondheim pairings reveal hidden depths in both composers. We’re blessed with a cast who can nail all the disparate styles: rapidly rising star Christine Taylor Price, and baritone Theo Hoffman (headliner of the GRAMMY®-nominated album on NYFOS Records, Schubert/Beatles).”

The 2025-26 NYFOS season continues this spring with two final dates: NYFOS’s annual Spring Gala on May 11, 2026, and the NYFOS Next Series, a special event created in collaboration with Luna Composition Lab, on June 1, 2026.

New York Festival of Song: Poulenc/Sondheim
Tuesday, April 7, 2026 at 8:00pm
Merkin Hall At Kaufman Music Center | New York, NY
Tickets: $20-79
Link: kaufmanmusiccenter.org/mch/event/new-york-festival-of-song-poulenc-sondheim/ 

About Christine Taylor Price
Christine Taylor Price invigorates opera and song audiences with her musicality and acting prowess in the stories she tells.  Most at home on stage, Christine dazzles with her “pure crystalline sound, coloratura and high flying, heavily ornamented arias,” but can equally convince you that you are back in the days of old Broadway, singing the classics in her own distinctive way. A previous semi-finalist in the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions, Ms. Price has performed with the New York Philharmonic, New World Symphony and at Carnegie Hall. Learn more at christinetaylorprice.com/

About Theo Hoffman
Theo Hoffman is among the most versatile and refined young singers of his generation. Mr. Hoffman has been seen performing with Los Angeles Opera, Opera Philadelphia, Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, Atlanta Opera, Des Moines Metro Opera, Marlboro Music Festival, Los Angeles Philharmonic, the Salzburg Mozartwoche, and the Israel Philharmonic Orchestra. He was the recipient of a 2018 Richard Tucker Music Foundation Sara Tucker Study Grant and was a Grand Finalist in the 2016 Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions. Learn more at www.theo-hoffman.com/.

About Steven Blier
Steven Blier is the Artistic Director of the New York Festival of Song (NYFOS), which he co-founded in 1988 with Michael Barrett. Since its inception, he has programmed, performed, translated, and annotated more than 170 vocal recitals with repertoire spanning five centuries of art song and popular music. New York Magazine gave NYFOS its award for Best Classical Programming, while Opera News proclaimed Blier “the coolest dude in town.” 

In November 2025, Norton Books published Blier’s memoir From Ear to Ear: A Pianist’s Love Affair with Song. It was chosen as a Wall Street Journal “Best Book of the Year.”

Mr. Blier’s recital partners have included Renée Fleming, Cecilia Bartoli, Samuel Ramey, Susan Graham, Jessye Norman, and José van Dam, in venues ranging from Carnegie Hall to La Scala. He has premiered works of Corigliano, Moravec, Rorem, and Bolcom, many of which were commissioned by NYFOS.

A Juilliard faculty member, many of his students, including Julia Bullock, Sasha Cooke, Paul Appleby, and John Brancy, have gone on to be valued recitalists and international opera stars.

Mr. Blier launched NYFOS Records in 2021. Its latest release is the Grammy®-nominated Schubert / Beatles, with baritone Theo Hoffman. Blier’s extensive discography also includes the Grammy®-winning premiere recording of Bernstein’s Arias and Barcarolles (Koch International).

A native New Yorker, Blier received a BA with Honors in English Literature at Yale University, studying piano with Alexander Farkas. He completed his musical studies in New York with Martin Isepp and Paul Jacobs. 

About Bénédicte Jourdois
French pianist and vocal coach Bénédicte Jourdois is the Associate Artistic Director of the New York Festival of Song, a teacher and coach at the Juilliard School and the Metropolitan Opera’s Lindemann Young Artist Development Program, and a member of the Met Music Staff. Since 2019, she has co-directed the Schwab Vocal Rising Stars program at Caramoor with Steven Blier. 

An active recitalist, Ms. Jourdois regularly performs throughout Europe and the United States. As a coach and pianist, she has worked with Carnegie Hall’s SongStudio, the Merola Opera Program at San Francisco Opera, the Los Angeles Philharmonic, Los Angeles Opera, Washington National Opera, Washington Concert Opera, Houston Grand Opera, Chicago Lyric Ryan Opera Center, Chicago Opera Theatre, Pittsburgh Opera, Opera Philadelphia, Palm Beach Opera, Opera Saratoga, Rice University, the Chautauqua Institution voice program, the Castleton Festival, Spoleto Festival USA, and Folkestone on Song in Kent. She was previously a faculty member at the Curtis Institute in Philadelphia and at the Manhattan School of Music. 

Born in Paris, Ms. Jourdois holds degrees from the Conservatoire National de Région de Saint-Maur, the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique de Lyon, Mannes College, and the Juilliard School and is a graduate of the Lindemann Young Artist Development Program at The Metropolitan Opera. She started her coaching career as a pianist for her mentor, Marlena Malas, in New York and in Chautauqua.

About New York Festival of Song
Now in its 38th season, New York Festival of Song (NYFOS) is dedicated to creating intimate song concerts of great beauty and originality. Weaving music, poetry, history, and humor into evenings of compelling theater, NYFOS fosters community among artists and audiences. Each program entertains and educates in equal measure. Founded by pianists Michael Barrett and Steven Blier in 1988, NYFOS continues to produce its series of thematic song programs, drawing together rarely-heard songs of all kinds, overriding traditional distinctions between musical genres, exploring the character and language of other cultures, and the personal voices of song composers and lyricists.

Since its founding, NYFOS has particularly celebrated American song. Among the many highlights is the double bill of one-act comic operas, Bastianello and Lucrezia, by John Musto and William Bolcom, both with libretti by Mark Campbell, commissioned and premiered by NYFOS in 2008 and recorded on Bridge Records. In addition to Bastianello and Lucrezia and the 2008 Bridge Records release of Spanish Love Songs with Joseph Kaiser and the late Lorraine Hunt Lieberson, NYFOS has produced five recordings on the Koch label, including a Grammy Award-winning disc of Bernstein’s Arias and Barcarolles, and the Grammy-nominated recording of Ned Rorem’s Evidence of Things Not Seen (also a NYFOS commission) on New World Records. In 2014, Canción Amorosa, a CD of Spanish song – Basque, Catalan, Castilian, and Sephardic – was released on the GPR label, with soprano Corinne Winters accompanied by Steven Blier.

In January of 2022, NYFOS Records issued its first album, From Rags to Riches, with Stephanie Blythe and William Burden. In January of 2025, they released their sixth album, Schubert/Beatles, with Theo Hoffman, Julia Bullock, Kunal Lahiri, and Mr. Blier, which was nominated for a 2026 Grammy Award. The new CD joins NYFOS Records’s burgeoning discography, alongside A Picnic Cantata (2022), the first stereo recording of a hidden gem by Paul Bowles and James Schuyler; Black & Blue (2023), the debut solo album of British-American tenor Joshua Blue collaborating with Steven Blier; Mi País: Songs of Argentina (2023) featuring bass-baritone Federico De Michelis and pianist and Steven Blier; and NYFOS Records: The Singles, Vol. 1 (2024), a wide-ranging compilation drawn from over 20 years of archival material, including tracks featuring Michael Spyres, Justin Austin, and Bernarda Fink. NYFOS Records has reached rapidly growing audiences in over 100 countries, with well over 2.5 million streams to date.

In November 2010, NYFOS debuted NYFOS Next, a mini-series for new songs, hosted by guest composers in intimate venues, including OPERA America's National Opera Center, National Sawdust, the DiMenna Center for Classical Music, the Ann Goodman Recital Hall at Kaufman Music Center. Pianist and new music specialist Nathaniel LaNasa has served as series curator since 2022, when NYFOS Next found its current home, the former Rubin Museum space in Chelsea. 

NYFOS is passionate about nurturing the artistry and careers of young singers, and has developed training residencies around the country, including with The Juilliard School’s Ellen and James S. Marcus Institute for Vocal Arts (now in its 18th year); Caramoor Center for Music and the Arts (its 18th year in March 2026); San Francisco Opera Center (over 20 years as of February 2018); Glimmerglass Opera (2008–2010); and its newest project, NYFOS@North Fork in Orient, NY.

NYFOS’s concert series, touring programs, radio broadcasts, recordings, and educational activities continue to spark new interest in the creative possibilities of the song program and have inspired the creation of thematic vocal series around the world. Learn more at www.nyfos.org. 

*Photo Credit: Cherylynn Tsushima