Industry News
MA's Free Guide to (Mostly) Free Streams, May 31-June 7
We will be updating this list weekly. Please note that all times are given in U.S. Eastern Time (ET). To calculate in other time zones or counties, British Summer Time (BST) is currently five hours ahead of ET and Central European Time (CET) is currently six hours ahead. U.S. Central Daylight Time (CDT) is one hour behind ET. Mountain Time (MT) is two hours behind ET, while Pacific Time (PT) is three hours behind. Contact editor@musicalamerica.com.
Classical music coverage on Musical America is supported in part by a grant from the Rubin Institute for Music Criticism, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, and the Ann and Gordon Getty Foundation. Musical America makes all editorial decisions.
** Highly recommended
Monday, May 31
** 7 am ET: Vocal Arts DC presents The Journey Home: Live from the Kennedy Center. Inspired by the 100th anniversary of the end of WWI, the concert explores themes of longing, loss, love, and the search for peace in the wake of catastrophe. Musical selections range from Schubert's “Der Wanderer” to Vaughan Williams's Songs of Travel, as well as popular tunes and art songs by composers and poets who died in the war. The concert is performed by Grammy Award winning baritone, John Brancy, and pianist Peter Dugan in a 2018 sold out live performance from the Kennedy Center’s Terrace Theater. View here and again at 2 pm ET.
8 am ET: Wigmore Hall presents Exaudi. This lunchtime recital, entitled Chromatic Renaissance, intersperses 16th and 17th-century works with a selection of madrigals from contemporary composer James Weeks’s Primo Libro. The program opens with four of Orlande de Lassus’s Sibylline Prophecies Motets. Register, view here and on demand for 30 days. LIVE
10 am ET: Medici.tv presents Puccini’s Le Villi. When Roberto is called to Mainz, his wife Anna's dreams foretell his demise. Seasons pass and Roberto has fallen under a siren's enchantment. The grief-stricken Anna dies in despair, which spurs her father, Guglielmo, to seek the help of the Villi, forest fairies who force unfaithful lovers to dance themselves to death. Francesco Saponaro offers an elegant production of Puccini's first staged work. Cast includes Maria Teresa Leva, Leonardo Caimi, and Elia Fabbian. Marco Angius conducts. Subscribe to view here. LIVE
2 pm ET: Hamburg International Music Festival presents Insula Orchestra & Laurence Equilbey. Laurence Equilbey conducts Insula Orchestra and Accentus Choir in an all-Schumann program comprising Vom Pagen und der Königstochter Op. 140, Des Sängers Fluch Op. 139, Requiem für Mignon Op. 98b, and Nachtlied Op. 108. View here.
2:30 pm ET: Wigmore Hall presents Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective. Wigmore Hall’s 120th anniversary sees the Hall’s Associate Ensemble joined by soprano Mary Bevan for Fauré’s La bonne chanson, presented in the composer’s rarely performed arrangement for voice, piano and string quintet. The Kaleidoscope Chamber Collective encloses this work with Florence Price’s Piano Quintet, with its third movement’s Juba dance structure, and Mendelssohn’s 1824 Sextet in D. Register, view here and on demand for 30 days. LIVE
5 pm ET: Spoleto Festival presents Chamber Music Program II. Geoff Nuttall hosts highlights of the festival’s daily chamber music program including the premiere of Jessica Meyer’s She Sailed the Savage Seas performed by the St. Lawrence String Quartet and the third movement of Ludwig Thuille’s Piano Quintet No. 2, Op. 20 with pianist Gilles Vonsattel. Meyer composed her new work for the St. Lawrence String Quartet, celebrating their 25th season at Spoleto Festival USA. The piece was inspired by Anne Bonny, a female pirate who was said to have lived in Charleston in the early 17th century. View here until June 18.
7:30 pm ET: Met Opera Streams presents Puccini’s Turandot. Starring Christine Goerke, Eleonora Buratto, Yusif Eyvazov, and James Morris, conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin. Production by Franco Zeffirelli. From October 12, 2019. View here and for 24 hours.
7:30 pm ET: Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center presents Inside Chamber Music: Haydn's Trio in E. Bruce Adolphe is joined by CMS artists to examine Haydn's Trio in E for Piano, Violin, and Cello, Hob. XV:28. Composed six years after Mozart's death, this piano trio shows Haydn as a mature master of great subtlety. Tickets $15. View here and on demand for one week.
8 pm ET: Festival Casals presents Trío Sanromá. Trío Sanromá (Francisco Cabán, violin, Luis Miguel Rojas, cello, and Diana Figueroa, piano) play Quiñones’s Folié, Beethoven’s Piano Trio No. 4, Op. 11, Gassenhauer, Mendelssohn’s Piano Trio No. 1, Op. 49, and Del Águila’s Tango Trio. View here and on demand.
Tuesday, June 1
12 pm ET: Kirkpatrick & Kinslow Productions presents The Sound of Identity. Tulsa Opera's 2019 production of Mozart's Don Giovanni featuring transgender baritone Lucia Lucas in the title role marked the first time an American opera company cast a trans woman in a principal role. The Sound of Identity, a full-length film documenting Lucas's experience in Tulsa and featuring her mentor Tulsa Opera Artistic Director and composer Tobias Picker, is released to coincide with, and celebrate, Pride Month 2021. The film is directed by James Kicklighter. People in the USA and Canada can rent the film on a variety of platforms including: iTunes, Amazon, Google Play, Playstation Xbox, Fandango Now, Vudu, Hoopla, DirecTV, Dish, InDemand (Charter, Comcast, Cox, Spectrum), and Vubiquity (TMobile, Verizon).
** 2 pm ET: Royal Liverpool Philharmonic presents Sheku Kanneh-Mason plays Dvorák. Sheku Kanneh-Mason performs Dvorák’s Cello Concerto, given here in a specially commissioned reduced instrumentation by George Morton to accommodate present restrictions. Written a surprise Christmas present for his wife, Richard Wagner gave the first performance of Siegfried Idyll with just 13 players outside her bedroom door 150 years ago. Rory Macdonald conducts. The concert will be preceded by a live pre-concert talk on Zoom and a post-concert Zoom Q&A with musicians and conductor in a sort of post-match analysis. Tickets £10 and view here for 30 days. LIVE
2:15. pm ET: Gürzenich-Orchester Köln presents Dvorák & Schubert. Nathalie Stutzmann conducts the Gürzenich-Orchester Köln in three of Dvorák’s Slavonic Dances Op.46 (Nos. 1, 2, & 8) and Schubert’s Symphony No. 8, The Great, D 944. Tickets pay what you can. View here and repeated June 3 and 6 at 2:15 pm.
**2:30 pm ET: Wigmore Hall presents COVID’s Metamorphoses. Pianist Graham Johnson leads an all-star vocal line up (Sarah Fox soprano, Christine Rice mezzo-soprano, Alessandro Fisher tenor, Roderick Williams baritone, and William Thomas bass) to continue Wigmore Hall’s anniversary week celebrations with a song gala reflecting on our pandemic journey, through the feelings and experiences we have all had in the last 14 months; danger, lockdown, hope and our continued recovery. Register, view here and on demand for 30 days. LIVE
3:30 pm ET: Dallas Symphony presents Handel, Haydn & Mendelssohn. Nicholas McGegan conducts the DSO with organist Bradley Hunter Welch in Haydn’s Symphony No. 103 in E-flat, Drum Roll, Handel’s Organ Concerto, The Cuckoo and the Nightingale, and Mendelssohn’s Symphony No. 4 in A, Italian. View here.
5 pm ET: Spoleto Festival presents Chamber Music Program III. Geoff Nuttall hosts highlights of the festival’s daily chamber music program including the premiere of Jessica Meyer’s From Our Ashes. Meyer composed this work for violinist Livia Sohn. The two had first met as students at Juilliard and Meyer said she always admired Sohn’s playing and powerful stage presence. The program also includes the second movement of Schubert’s String Quintet in C, D. 956 played by St. Lawrence String Quartet and cellist Paul Wiancko. View here until June 18.
6 pm ET: National Sawdust presents Fire This Time. A new series from poet and musician Lynne Procope inspired by the intellectual and artistic legacy of James Baldwin. Conceived as a virtual salon, Procope will sit down with musicians, critics, stick fighters, DJs, academics, curators, poets, and music lovers at the ley lines of organizing, activism, and the legacy of perhaps the most influential writer of the last century. She will be joined by Rondel Benjamin, Chief Dreamer and co-founder of Bois Academy of Trinidad and Tobago, to explore the cultural history and foundational music of the Kongo artform of Kalinda as it survives in the stick fighting arenas of the islands. Register for Zoom and view here.
** 7 pm ET: Kaufman Music Center presents Face the Music: 50 for the Future. String quartet musicians from Kaufman Music Center’s Face the Music teen new music program join high school musicians from across the U.S. for a performance of six new pieces commissioned by Kronos Quartet’s 50 for the Future project. Program: Joan Jeanreaud’s Knock with Face the Music (NYC); Wu Man’s Glimpses of Muqam Chebiyat, MVT II: “Chebiyat Muqam, Third Dastan” with Oakland School for the Arts &and Ruth Asawa San Francisco School for the Arts; Rhiannon Giddens’s At the Purchaser's Option with variations with Duke Ellington School of the Arts (Washington, D.C.); Mario Galeano Toro’s Tolo Midi with ‘Iolani School (Honolulu, HI), Merlijn Twaalfhoven’s Play with Booker T. Washington High School for the Performing & Visual Arts (Dallas, TX); and Angélica Negrón’s Marejada with Kronos Quartet and students from all six music programs. Tickets $15. View here until June 8.
7 pm ET: Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra presents American Anthems. Jeff Tyzik conducts a program of music including “O Canada”, “The Star-Spangled Banner”, The National Emblem March, Give My Regards To George!: A George M. Cohan Medley, The Colonel Bogey March “Amazing Grace” and The Stars & Stripes Forever March. Tickets $10. View here until July 1.
7:30 pm ET: Nightly Met Opera Streams presents Saint-Saëns’s Samson et Dalila. Starring Elina Garanca, Roberto Alagna, Laurent Naouri, Elchin Azizov, and Dmitry Belosselskiy, conducted by Sir Mark Elder. Production by Darko Tresnjak. From October 20, 2018. View here and for 24 hours.
8 pm ET: Festival Casals presents Coralia. Carmen Acevedo directs Coralia in choral music by Rheinberger, Dubra, Narverud, Forrest, Marenzio, Randall Stroope, Monteverdi, Ticheli, Brahms, Runestad, Padilla, and Peña. View here and on demand.
Wednesday, June 2
** 1 pm ET: Bergen International Music Festival presents Bergen Philharmonic with Peter Herresthal & Missy Mazzoli. Composer Missy Mazzoli performs her Grammy-nominated Vespers for Violin with Peter Herresthal and the Bergen Philharmonic performs the world premiere of the orchestral version of Mazzoli's Dark with Excessive Bright. The rest of the program is also American, and includes George Walker’s Lyric for Strings, John Adams’s The Chairman Dances, and Charles Ives's Third Symphony, The Camp Meeting. Tickets $30. View here until June 23.
2 pm ET: London Symphony Orchestra presents Copland, Shostakovich & Tchaikovsky. Michael Tilson Thomas conducts the LSO with pianist Yuja Wang in Copland’s Our Town Suite, Shostakovich’s Piano Concerto No 2, Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No 2, Little Russian. Tickets from $10. View here.
** 2 pm ET: Hamburg International Music Festival presents Song Of America I. The first of a two-part concert featuring sopranos Louise Toppin and Leah Hawkins, mezzo-soprano Ema Nikolovska, tenor Lawrence Brownlee, baritones Justin Austin and Thomas Hampson, and pianists Howard Watkins and Joseph Joubert. A celebration of Black music including works by Kurt Pahlen, Hermann Reutter, Wilhelm Grosz, Howard Swanson, Florence B. Price, Margaret Bonds, Robert Owens, H. Leslie Adams, Andre Myers, George Walker, Hale Smith, Harriette Davison Watkins, Richard Thompson, Brandon J. Spencer, Damien Sneed, and Leonard Bernstein. View here.
** 2:30 pm ET: Wigmore Hall presents Mitsuko Uchida. The Hall’s anniversary celebrations continue with Mitsuko Uchida. Schubert’s 1827 pieces for solo piano were published in two sets of four; it has been said that the composer was influenced by the music of Czech composers Jan Václav Vorísek and Václav Tomásek. Register, view here and on demand for 30 days. LIVE
3 pm ET: London Philharmonic presents Swan Lake. Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake is more than just four acts of some of the most gloriously inspired dance music of all time: it’s a profoundly human drama of love, struggle, destiny and redemption. After 14 years of exploration, Vladimir Jurowski returns to the composer at the heart of his musical life in this full-length concert performance. Filmed on May 2. View here for seven days.
7:30 pm ET: Nightly Met Opera Streams presents Bizet’s Carmen. Starring Aleksandra Kurzak, Clémentine Margaine, Roberto Alagna, and Alexander Vinogradov, conducted by Louis Langrée. Production by Sir Richard Eyre. From February 2, 2019. View here and for 24 hours.
8 pm ET: Baltimore Symphony Orchestra presents BSO Sessions: Name That Tune. The BSO is back for another fun, interactive round of Name That Tune. Can you guess the composer and piece as clues scroll across the screen? Hurry and say your answer before the work is revealed. Tickets $10. View here and on demand.
8 pm ET: Roulette presents C. Spencer Yeh. A solo concert of performance on violin, voice, and electronics, presented in two parts with intermission. C. Spencer Yeh is recognized for interdisciplinary activities as an artist, improviser, and composer, as well as for his music project Burning Star Core. View here. LIVE
Thursday, June 3
8 am ET: Wigmore Hall presents Gweneth Ann Rand & Simon Lepper. The Hall’s final anniversary concert is a recital by Gweneth Ann Rand, one of Wigmore Hall’s newly appointed Associate Artists, with a program which Rand describes as “a personal reflection of Black voices and muses, stretching back in time to the Black Venus, who inspired the poetry of Baudelaire.” Register, view here and on demand for 30 days. LIVE
11 am ET: American Classical Orchestra presents Beethoven Sonatas. The first of seven recitals performed on fortepiano. Eric Zivian preforms Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 12 in A-flat, Op. 26 Funeral March. Recorded in January 2021 by videographer Boby Borisov in Berkeley, California on a Paul Poletti copy of a Jean-Marie Dulcken fortepiano c. 1795. View here and on demand.
12 pm ET: The Boston Pops presents An Evening with Chris Thile and the Stars of Tomorrow. Keith Lockhart and the Pops host the 11th annual Fidelity Investments Young Artists Competition concert. Then, mandolinist Chris Thile joins the orchestra for his Boston Pops debut. The Pops add to the celebration with audience favorites drawn from recordings of the last twenty-five years, including Runnin’ Wild, Lockhart’s debut album with the Pops. One week passes from $9. View here until June 19.
1 pm ET: Bergen International Music Festival presents Bergen Philharmonic plays Grieg. James Gaffigan conducts the BPO in Missy Mazzoli’s The night ahead and no real fate, for piano and electronics with the composer at the keyboard, Barber’s Adagio for strings, and Grieg’s Piano Concerto in A minor, Op. 16 with soloist Håvard Gimse. Tickets $30. View here until June 23.
1:15 pm ET: Midtown Concerts presents Jude Ziliak and Elliot Figg. More than a century before Liszt’s and Berlioz’s names became synonymous with programmatic music, Giuseppe Tartini’s evocation of Tasso and Virgil was so powerful that he himself was reported to go into a mystical trance while playing. Violinist Jude Ziliak and harpsichordist Elliot Figg present some of the earliest program music ever written. View here.
** 2 pm ET: DG Stage presents Rossini’s L’Italiana in Algeri. Cecilia Bartoli plays Isabella as a strong, independent woman who has no intentions of accepting the advances of the powerful Mustafà. In Leiser and Caurier’s staging, Mustafà is no longer an Ottoman bey, but a local gangster who smuggles electronics at the port of modern-day Algiers. Ildar Abdrazakov sings the leering macho, looking for a love affair with the beautiful Italian, Edgardo Rocha is Isabella’s lover Lindoro, Rebeca Olvera sings Elvira, with Alessandro Corbelli as Taddeo and conductor Jean-Christophe Spinosi leading Ensemble Matheus. Tickets EUR 9.90. View here until June 6.
2:30 pm ET: Wigmore Hall presents Elias String Quartet & Daniel Tong. The Elias String Quartet’s eclectic program ranges from a 17th-century selection of Purcell’s Fantazias, through to the 19th century with Dvorák's Second Piano Quintet, for which they are joined by British pianist Daniel Tong. Register, view here and on demand for 30 days. LIVE
** 2:30 pm ET: Royal Philharmonic Orchestra presents Vasily Petrenko with Stephen Hough. Music Director Designate Vasily Petrenko conducts the RPO with pianist Stephen Hough in Saint-Saëns’s Fifth Piano Concerto, Egyptian. The concert opens with Berlioz’s Le Corsaire Overture, with Scriabin’s Second Symphony to close. Tickets £10. View here until June 19.
5 pm ET: Spoleto Festival presents Chamber Music Program IV. Geoff Nuttall hosts highlights of the festival’s daily chamber music program including the first movement from Schumann’s Violin Sonata No. 1 in A minor, Op. 105 with Geoff Nuttall, violin and Pedja Muzijevic, piano and the first movement of Mozart’s Trio in E-flat, K. 498 Kegelstatt with Pedja Muzijevic, Todd Palmer, clarinet, and Ayane Kozasa, viola. View here until June 18.
** 7 pm ET: New York City Ballet presents Balanchine’s Vienna Waltzes. As a finale to the 2021 digital season, a complete performance of Balanchine’s Vienna Waltzes. Created in 1977 and set to waltzes by Johann Strauss II, Lehár, and Richard Strauss, this work featuring more than 50 dancers is only performed by New York City Ballet. The ballet transforms from a sylvan forest glen to a dance hall to a glittering society café to, at last, a majestic, mirrored ballroom. This performance was filmed in 2013 and features Rebecca Krohn, Tyler Angle, Megan Fairchild, Anthony Huxley, Erica Pereira, Sean Suozzi, Teresa Reichlen, Ask la Cour, Maria Kowroski and Jared Angle in the principal roles. View here for two weeks.
7:30 pm ET: Nightly Met Opera Streams presents Donizetti’s La Fille du Régiment. Starring Pretty Yende, Stephanie Blythe, Kathleen Turner, Javier Camarena, and Maurizio Muraro, conducted by Enrique Mazzola. Production by Laurent Pelly. From March 2, 2019. View here and for 24 hours.
7:30 pm ET: Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center presents Metamorphosis. Archival video recordings woven together into never-before-heard concert pairings with a Q&A at intermission with the artists. Program: Strauss’s Metamorphosen for Two Violins, Two Violas, Two Cellos, and Bass, and Mozart’s String Quartet in C, K. 465, Dissonance (played by the Orion String Quartet). View here and on demand for one week.
7:30 pm ET: Detroit Symphony Orchestra presents Nagano conducts Schubert. Kent Nagano leads the DSO in a performance of Schubert’s Fifth Symphony, written during a time when the composer was captivated by the works of Mozart. Japanese composer Toshio Hosokawa’s opera Stilles Meer was his response to the March 2011 tsunami and subsequent Fukushima nuclear disaster. Tickets $12. View here for two weeks.
7:30 pm ET: Carnegie Hall presents Remembering Greenwood. Marking the 100th anniversary of the Greenwood Massacre, Derrick “D-Nice” Jones presents a civic–special edition of his popular Club Quarantine to showcase arts and music as a powerful driver of building and rebuilding communities. Joining him is Valeisha Butterfield Jones, the Recording Academy’s first-ever Chief Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Officer. The episode also features artists from Tulsa who are part of Fire in Little Africa, a compilation hip-hop album and documentary that is helping to usher in a new era. View here until Jun 18.
8 pm ET: American Youth Symphony presents 56th Annual Gala. AYS will celebrate the end of its 2020-21 season and the perseverance of its musicians with the 56th Annual Gala. The virtual program will feature 31 AYS musicians performing Copland’s Three Latin-American Sketches, Anna Clyne’s Within her Arms, St. Georges’s Symphony No. 1, and Mozart’s Serenata Notturna. Following safety protocol guidelines, American Youth Symphony Music Director Carlos Izcaray will lead AYS musicians at UCLA’s Royce Hall for a recorded performance. Register and view here.
** 8 pm ET: Atlanta Symphony Orchestra presents Behind the Curtain: Thibaudet & a Latin Fiesta. French piano virtuoso Jean-Yves Thibaudet plays music by Hollywood composer Aaron Zigman. Also, Miguel Harth-Bedoya leads the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra in Jimmy López's thumping party piece Fiesta!, inspired by the Peruvian club scene. Gabriela Lena Frank’s Elegía Andina and Falla’s Suite No. 1 from The Three-Cornered Hat complete the program. Tickets $20. View here. LIVE
8 pm ET: Festival Casals presents Vadym Khodolenko. The Russian pianist performs Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 14, Op 27/2, Moonlight and Seven Bagatelles, Op. 33, Rachmaninov’s Variations on a Theme of Corelli, and from Albéniz’s Iberia: “Corpus Cristi”, “El Polo”, and “Eritaña”. View here and on demand.
** 10 pm ET: Cal Performances presents Jordi Savall. With La Capella Reial de Catalunya and Le Concert des Nations, multi-instrumental virtuoso, conductor, and musical polymath Jordi Savall offers selections from Monteverdi’s Madrigals of Love and War. With these sumptuous works, published late in his life, the composer proposed a groundbreaking model for how music could convey a wide range of emotion. The set includes a wealth of musical treasures, including the wondrous Lamento della Ninfa and Combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda. Tickets $15. View here until September 1.
Friday, June 4
12 pm ET: Carnegie Hall presents The Marriage of Figaro. Mozart’s opera is a comedy about love and lust between social classes, with mistaken identities and hilarious misunderstandings. The Salzburg Festival’s 2006 production features Anna Netrebko as Susanna and Ildebrando D’Arcangelo in the title role, with conductor Nikolaus Harnoncourt and the Vienna Philharmonic—the orchestra that has performed at Carnegie Hall more frequently than any other large ensemble from outside the United States. View here until Jun 11.
** 1 pm ET: OperaVision presents Bach’s St. John Passion. Bach's seminal work of sacred art paints a monumental fresco of life's journey to redemption. Calixto Bieito directs this dramatized oratorio. With the help of an excellent cast (including Benjamin Appl as Jesus and Joshua Ellicott as The Evangelist), the period orchestra Les Talens Lyriques, and a group of amateur singers which form the chorus at the heart of the narrative, Bieito constructs a dialogue with this work today to confront pain and death. Recorded on May 10 and 11, 2021 at Théâtre du Châtelet, Paris. View here for six months. LIVE
1 pm Tesla Quartet presents A Bartók Journey Part V, open rehearsal. See June 5, 7:30 pm.
2 pm ET: DG Stage presents Strauss’s An Alpine Symphony. In a concert recorded at Berlin’s Tempodrom, the Deutsche Symphonie-Orchester Berlin and Chief Conductor Robin Ticciati perform Richard Strauss’s An Alpine Symphony. Joining them to talk about his life as a climber and explorer is Reinhold Messner, famed for having made the first solo ascent of Everest and for being the first mountaineer to conquer all 14 “eight-thousanders”. Tickets EUR 9.90. View here until June 6.
** 2 pm ET: Hamburg International Music Festival presents Song Of America II. Sopranos Louise Toppin and Leah Hawkins, mezzo-soprano Ema Nikolovska, tenor Lawrence Brownlee, baritones Justin Austin and Thomas Hampson, pianists Howard Watkins and Joseph Joubert, and players from Deutschen Kammerphilharmonie Bremen celebrate Black music with works by Henry Thacker Burleigh, Florence B. Price, Samuel Coleridge-Taylor, William Grant Still, David Baker, Adolphus Hailstork, Robert Owens, Anthony R. Green, Peter Ashbourne, Shawn Okpebholo, Rosephanye Powell, Valerie Capers, B.E. Boykin, Jasmine Barnes, and Tyshawn Sorey. View here.
2 pm ET: Concertgebouworkest presents Janine Jansen. Artist in residence Janine Jansen and musicians from the Concertgebouworkest perform Stravinsky's The Soldier's Tale, a parable about a soldier who trades his violin with the devil for a book that can predict the future of the economy. In 1918, Stravinsky noted that subsequent performances should be adapted to the time and place where they would be performed. Six musicians from the Concertgebouworkest and Jansen are happy to listen, assisted by actor Vincent van der Valk and dancer Carolyn Bolton. View here.
2:30 pm ET: Wigmore Hall presents Britten Oboe Quartet. Mark Simpson’s Oboe Quartet was premièred at Wigmore Hall in June 2019 and is dedicated to Nicholas Daniel, founder of the Britten Oboe Quartet. Thea Musgrave has this to say about her 2008 work, Cantilena: “The work is a short, lyrical piece where an outsider (the oboe) joins the group (a string trio) and adds to their dialogue. At first the newcomer is treated with a mixture of suspicion and agitation, but eventually is made welcome.” Register, view here and on demand for 30 days. LIVE
3 pm ET: University of Washington’s Meany Center presents Emerson String Quartet. The Emerson Quartet performs George Walker’s Lyric for Strings, Mozart’s String Quartet in D Major, K. 575, and Shostakovich’s String Quartet No. 14. View here until June 11.
4:30 pm ET: Bergen International Music Festival presents Ole Christian Haagenrud. Performing on Grieg’s own piano from his villa at Troldhaugen, Ole Christian Haagenrud plays music by Grieg, Chopin, Missy Mazzoli, Brahms, Rachmaninov, Schubert, Madsen, and Kapustin. Tickets $30. View here until June 23.
5 pm ET: Spoleto Festival presents Chamber Music Program V. Geoff Nuttall hosts highlights of the festival’s daily chamber music program including movements from Handel’s Oboe Concerto in G minor, HWV 287 with soloist James Austin Smith. View here until June 18.
** 7:30 pm ET: Nightly Met Opera Streams presents The Gershwins’ Porgy & Bess. Starring Angel Blue, Golda Schultz, Latonia Moore, Denyce Graves, Frederick Ballentine, Eric Owens, Alfred Walker, and Donovan Singletary, conducted by David Robertson. Production by James Robinson. From February 1, 2020. View here and for 24 hours.
7:30 pm ET: New York Opera Festival presents Little Opera Theatre of NY: Monteverdi & the Seicento. One of the earliest Venetian chamber operas, Il combattimento di Tancredi e Clorinda, by Claudio Monteverdi, and music of the time by Barbara Strozzi and Dario Castello. Featuring tenor Raúl Melo as narrator with music director Elliot Figg at the harpsichord leading a period instrument ensemble. Presented as a livestream from St. John’s in the Village, NYC. Tickets $5. View here.
7:30 pm ET: Detroit Symphony Orchestra presents Mozart Piano Concerto No 21. Written in a fever of productivity at the height of the composer’s career, Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 21 exudes the richness and majesty of Mozart at his best. Tickets $12. View here. LIVE
8 pm ET: LA Opera presents Signature Recital: J’Nai Bridges. Filmed at Dorothy Chandler Pavilion, Los Angeles, a recital with mezzo-soprano J’Nai Bridges and pianist Jeremy Frank of music by Brahms and Gounod, and an inspiring collection of songs by J. Rosamond Johnson, Carlos Simon, Dave Ragland, Florence B. Price, Margaret Bonds and Shawn E. Okpebholo, along with a Stevie Wonder classic. Tickets $45 for the series of five recitals. View here until July 1.
8 pm ET: Washington Performing Arts presents Schaghajegh Nosrati. German pianist Schaghajegh Nosrati plays on the stage of the Kennedy Center Terrace Theater, performing a cornerstone of her repertoire, The Art of Fugue by J.S. Bach. Her ongoing mentor Sir András Schiff has praised the “astonishing clarity, purity, and maturity” of her Bach performances. Following the Headline Artist Performance, Nosrati and Schiff take part in an incisive Linger Longer conversation on The Art of Fugue. Tickets $20. View here until June 10.
8 pm ET: Our Concerts Live presents Russian Masters. From West Cork Chamber Music Festival, Ukrainian pianist Anna Fedorova performs a program by the great Russian masters. Scriabin completed his Second Sonata on his honeymoon in the Crimea and you can almost see the glitter of moonlight on water. His single movement Black Mass Sonata begins mysteriously before developing into a grotesque march that builds to a grim and dissonant climax. Mussorgsky’s Pictures At An Exhibition evolves inexorably towards the uplifting “Great Gate of Kiev”. First Broadcast earlier today. Tickets $12. View here until June 6.
8 pm ET: Festival Casals presents Pablo Sáinz Villegas. The guitarist performs Albéniz’s “Sevilla” from Suite Española, Granados’s Danza española, No. 10 and No. 5, Rodrigo’s Invocación y danza, homage to Manuel de Falla, Tarrega’s Capricho árabe, Lágrima and Adelita, Albéniz’s Torre Bermeja, Op. 92, Mallorca, Op. 202, and “Asturias” from Suite española No. 1, Op. 47, and Giménez’s La boda de Luis Alonso. View here and on demand.
9:30 pm ET: Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra presents Tchaikovsky Serenade. Music Director Jaime Martín and Director and Designer James Darrah’s digital series celebrates collaboration in an age of isolation through classical music performances set to images and art created and processed in a first-of-its-kind digital studio. In the Season One Finale, Grant Gershon and the musicians of LACO perform Tchaikovsky’s Serenade for Strings. LACO has assembled the largest ensemble of musicians since February 2020 to close the season with a note of optimism. View here.
10:30 pm ET: Vancouver Symphony Orchestra presents Sun & Storm. Tania Miller conducts the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra in the world premiere of Vivian Fung’s Flute Concerto, Storm Within, with soloist Christie Reside, and Schubert’s Symphony No. 5. Tickets $10. View here.
11 pm ET: Seattle Symphony presents Wish Upon the Stars. Conductor Larry Loh returns to Seattle for this nostalgia-filled program featuring popular selections from Beauty and the Beast, How to Train Your Dragon, and The Jungle Book, as well as classical works from Fantasia and Fantasia 2000. View here.
Saturday, June 5
1 pm ET: Berliner Philharmoniker Digital Concert Hall presents Oramo conducts Chin & Sibelius. Sunwook Kim makes his debut with the Berliner Philharmoniker with Unsuk Chin’s brilliant and rhythmically challenging Piano Concerto. Sakari Oramo also conducts Sibelius’s Second Symphony. Tickets EUR 9.90. View here. LIVE
** 2:30 pm ET: Wigmore Hall presents Pavel Kolesnikov. The pianist’s program features some of Chopin’s most typical works surrounding two Mozart sonatas. K310 is the first of only two Mozart piano sonatas in a minor key. The last movement of K331, marked Alla turca, is often heard on its own and is one of Mozart's best-known piano pieces. Register, view here and on demand for 30 days. LIVE
5 pm ET: Paracademia presents The Atterbury House Sessions. Violinist Lara St. John curates a series of chamber music concerts celebrating the 150th anniversary of New York’s iconic Atterbury House. The series concludes with a gala performance by Lara St. John and friends. View here.
7 pm ET: Gay Men’s Chorus of Washington, DC presents GMCW Turns 40. GMCW celebrates 40 years with new digital recordings and archival footage from over the years. Songs include “From Now On” from The Greatest Showman, “Rise Up,” “Make Them Hear You” from Ragtime, “Truly Brave,” and a brand new anthem by Stephen Flaherty and Lynn Ahrens written for GMCW’s 40th Anniversary “Harmony’s Never Too Late!” Event will be ASL interpreted. Tickets $25. View here until June 20.
** 7:30 pm ET: Nightly Met Opera Streams presents Verdi’s Macbeth. Starring Anna Netrebko, Joseph Calleja, Željko Lucic, and René Pape, conducted by Fabio Luisi. Production by Adrian Noble. From October 11, 2014. View here and for 24 hours.
** 7:30 pm Tesla Quartet presents A Bartók Journey Part V. The Tesla Quartet journeys through the six string quartets of Béla Bartók. This week, a complete performance of String Quartet No. 5, Sz. 102. For a deeper dive, June 1 features a talk by Karóly Schranz, founding second violinist of the Takács Quartet, and there is a Virtual Open Rehearsal on June 4 at 1 pm ET. Register for complete series and view here. LIVE
7:30 pm ET: Charlotte Symphony presents Mozart Violin Concerto No. 3. Violinist Simone Porter joins the Charlotte Symphony for Mozart's Violin Concerto No 3, written when Mozart was only 19 years old. Resident Conductor Christopher James Lees leads the program that also includes Respighi's Ancient Airs and Dances. Tickets $20. View here until June 12.
8 pm ET: Moving Star presents In.Verse. Vocal ensemble Moving Star presents an evening of original works that merge improvisation and composition through the prismatic lens of poetry from the 13th century to the present. The program features a diverse array of poets, including Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, William Blake, Mary Oliver, Matsuo Basho, and Langston Hughes. The music is created and sung by the members of Morning Star: Sasha Bogdanowitsch, Thomas Cabaniss, Emily Eagen, Mark Etttinger, Tim Kiah, and Onome. In addition to a performance featuring live, synchronous singing, the program also highlights original video works from the past year of virtual performances. Tickets from $10. View here.
8 pm ET: Our Concerts Live presents From Beethoven to Weinberg. From West Cork Chamber Music Festival, the Danel Quartet perform Weinberg’s Fifth String Quartet and the delightful miniature Improvisation and Romance. Weinberg’s Fifth Quartet was composed in 1945, opening with a yearning threnody and a sparse introspective mood that lasts throughout the work, bursting out only in the high-octane Scherzo and briefly in the melodic finale. Beethoven’s early G Major Quartet is known in German-speaking countries as “Komplimentier Quartett,” which sums up its graceful and witty nature. First Broadcast earlier today. Tickets $12. View here until June 6.
8 pm ET: Festival Casals presents Brahms’s Piano Concerto No. 2. The Puerto Rico Symphony Orchestra is conducted by Maximiano Valdés with pianist André Watts. In Brahms’s Piano Concerto No. 2. From the broadcast concert on March 15, 2014. View here and on demand.
8:30 pm ET: Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra presents Chevalier de St. Georges. Joseph Boulogne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges (1745-1799) was a Black contemporary of Mozart. A composer, virtuoso violinist, conductor, and champion fencer, his music is heard all too infrequently. Ken-David Masur leads a program of his String Quartet, the Overture and Ballet from L’Amant anonyme, and Haydn’s Symphony No. 85, La Reine and Symphony No. 86. View here.
9 pm ET: San Antonio Symphony presents Classical Concert IX. Brett Mitchell conducts the SAS with violinist Sarah Silver Manzke in a program of works by Honegger, Piazzolla, and Mozart. Tickets $21. View here.
** 10:30 pm ET: Chamber Music Concerts presents Harlem Quartet. New York-based Harlem Quartet, currently serving a three-year residency at London’s Royal College of Music, collaborate with John Patitucci, double bass, who has been at the forefront of the jazz world for over 30 years. The program includes Patitucci’s Paintings in the Now, Chick Corea, arr. Patitucci Armando’s Rhumba, Bud Powell, arr. Patitucci Tempus Fugit, Patitucci’s Choro Luoco, and John Coltrane, arr. Patitucci Countdown. Tickets $20. View here.
11 pm ET: Jacaranda Music presents Inna Faliks in Recital. Pianist Inna Faliks gives world premiere performances of two of the works on her new album—Pursuit by Billy Childs and Old Ground by Timo Andres—alongside Ravel’s Gaspard de la Nuit. View here and on demand.
Sunday, June 6
6:30 am ET: Wigmore Hall presents Castalian String Quartet. Janácek’s String Quartet No. 1, Kreutzer Sonata, was written between October 13 and 28 1923. The composition was inspired by Tolstoy's novella The Kreutzer Sonata, which was in turn inspired by Beethoven's Violin Sonata No. 9, known as the Kreutzer Sonata from the name of its dedicatee, Rodolphe Kreutzer. Dvorák wrote his Op. 105 String Quartet—his last work in this genre—in 1895, when he had returned to Bohemia after his visit to America. Register, view here and on demand for 30 days. LIVE
11 am ET: IDAGIO Global Concert Hall presents Ex Cathedra: Into a World Unknown. Jeffrey Skidmore conducts Ex Cathedra in a program of music to soothe the soul and inspire. With a belated nod to the 400th anniversary of the Mayflower via a short trip to the New World, including some Latin American Baroque favorites, plus music from the British Isles and a performance of Alec Roth’s Earthrise, which expresses the awe of our planet when seen against the enormity of space. Tickets from $13. View here. LIVE
** 1 pm ET: Teatro alla Scala presents Marianne Crebassa in Recital. The French mezzo-soprano performs a recital with pianist Alphonse Cemin. View here and on demand.
** 1 pm ET: Bang on a Can presents The Bang on a Can Marathon of Song. A four-hour event featuring 15 performances streamed from musicians’ homes around the country and across the world. For this Marathon, all performances will include some type of vocalization—singing, speaking, murmuring, or other use of the voice. The live Marathon, featuring Fred Frith, L’Rain, Albert Kuvezin from Yat Kha, Charles Amirkhanian, Matana Roberts, and many more, will be hosted by Bang on a Can Co-Founders and Artistic Directors Michael Gordon, David Lang, and Julia Wolfe. View here.
** 2 pm ET: Hamburg International Music Festival presents Song Of America III. The third of a three-part concert featuring sopranos Louise Toppin and Leah Hawkins, tenor Lawrence Brownlee, and baritone Thomas Hampson. Roderick Cox conducts the Deutsche Kammerphilharmonie Bremen in Valerie Coleman’s Umoja / Anthem for Unity, William Grant Still’s “Golden Days” from the Opera Costaso and arias from Highway One, USA, George Walker’s Lyric for Strings, Hale Smith’s Four Negro Spirituals, Margaret Bonds’s “He’s Got the Whole World in His Hands”, and William Levi Dawson’s Negro Folk Symphony. View here.
2 pm ET: National Philharmonic presents Portrait of a Queen. First on this program is Eduardo Alonso-Crespo's Concerto for Viola featuring principal violist, Julius Wirth. Carlos Simon’s Portrait of a Queen traces the evolution of Black people in America through the lens of one figurative Black woman who represents strength, courage, and selflessness.?Dramatic spoken word, written by Courtney D. Ware, expresses the thoughts and feelings of the protagonist, enhancing her musical portrait. With Julius Wirth, viola and Aundi Marie Moore, narrator. View here.
2 pm ET: London Symphony Orchestra presents Grieg, Puccini, Herrmann, Barber & Vaughan Williams. Sir Simon Rattle conducts the London Symphony Orchestra in Grieg’s “Prelude” from Holberg Suite, Puccini’s Crisantemi, Herrmann’s Psycho, A Narrative for String Orchestra, Barber’s Adagio for Strings, Vaughan Williams’s Fantasia on a Theme by Thomas Tallis. View here for 90 days.
2:30 pm ET: Wigmore Hall presents The English Concert. Music from three German composers of the generation preceding Bach. Adam Drese was director of music at Arnstadt, where he died in 1701, shortly before Bach’s arrival. Like Bach, Johann Philipp Krieger was a composer and organist, as was Andreas Oswald; Oswald was one of Bach’s predecessors as court organist in Weimar. Harry Bicket directs with soprano Elizabeth Watts. Register, view here and on demand for 30 days. LIVE
3 pm ET: Boston Early Music Festival presents Campra’s Le Carnaval de Venise. Recorded June 18, 2017, at the Emerson Cutler Majestic Theatre, Boston, Massachusetts, Gilbert Blin’s production is led by Musical Directors Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs with Amanda Forsythe as Isabelle, Karina Gauvin as Leonore, Jesse Blumberg as Léandre and Douglas Williams as Rodolphe. Tickets $35. View here.
** 3 pm ET: Live from the Barbican presents Errolyn Wallen: Dido’s Ghost. Several years after the Carthaginian queen’s death, Dido’s Ghost finds Dido’s sister Anna abandoned on the shores of Aeneas’s new kingdom, igniting a murderous jealously in Aeneas’s wife Lavinia. As events play out, characters confront a past that refuses to fade. Errollyn Wallen’s new opera embraces and complements Purcell’s original, which is performed in its entirety as the centerpiece of a drama that is both old and new. Performed by the period instruments of the Dunedin Consort, past blurs into present and memory becomes emotion in this ambitious new commission. Tickets £12.50. View here.
3:30 pm ET: American Pianists Association presents 2021 American Pianists Awards. Due to the ongoing health crisis, finalists have recorded individual, non-public, adjudicated recitals. This week, Dominic Cheli plays Bach’s French Suite No. 5 in G, BWV 816, Laura Kaminsky’s Alluvion (world premiere, APA commission), Scriabin’s Fantasy in B Minor Op. 28, Carl Vine’s Piano Sonata No. 1, and Liszt’s Don Juan Fantasy. View here.
4 pm ET: Our Concerts Live presents Concertos from the Inside: Week 22: Mozart Violin Concerto No. 4. In a 24-part series, Rachel Barton Pine performs the entire solo violin part of the greatest violin concertos unaccompanied and shares her perspective on each, explaining how she prepares and how her performance connects to the work’s historical and musical context. The series is geared towards career violinists, advanced students, violin teachers, and violin aficionados. Tickets $20. Register and view here.
5 pm ET: Spoleto Festival presents Chamber Music Program VI. Geoff Nuttall hosts highlights of the festival’s daily chamber music program including Paul Wiancko’s American Haiku with Ayane Kozasa, viola and Paul Wiancko, cello, and the first movement of Dohnányi’s Sextet in C, Op. 37. View here until June 18.
6 pm ET: La Jolla Music Society presents Fung & Fu. Cellist Zlatomir Fung and pianist Richard Fu are streamed live from The Conrad performing Fauré’s Sonata No. 1 for Cello and Piano in D Minor, Op. 109, Berger’s Duo for Cello and Piano, and Beethoven’s Sonata No. 3 in A for Piano and Cello, Op. 69. Tickets $20. Register and view here for one week.
7:30 pm ET: Met Opera Streams presents Philip Glass’s Akhnaten. Starring Dísella Lárusdóttir, J’Nai Bridges, Anthony Roth Costanzo, Aaron Blake, Will Liverman, Richard Bernstein, and Zachary James, conducted by Karen Kamensek. Production by Phelim McDermott. From November 23, 2019. View here and for 24 hours.
8 pm ET: Our Concerts Live presents Cello Series II: Russia. From West Cork Chamber Music Festival, cellist Johannes Moser and pianist Paul Rivinius perform one of Weinberg’s Cello Sonatas, a lyrical but quiet work that livens up with a propulsive, hard-driven Finale that, inevitably, was written for Rostropovich. Shostakovich’s Cello Sonata is an early work, pre-dating his long duel with Stalin and the unpredictably repressive Soviet authorities. The gentle and untroubled lyricism of the first movement may come as a surprise, though the spiky, percussive piano part in the Scherzo is more familiar territory. First Broadcast earlier today. Tickets $12. View here until June 8.
10 pm ET: Music at Kohl Mansion presents Maxwell Quartet. One of Britain’s finest young string quartets, performs Dvorák’s String Quartet No. 13 in G Major, Op. 106 and a selection of Scottish Folk Songs. Tickets $20. View here and repeated June 10 at 9 pm ET.
Monday, June 7
** 8 am ET: Wigmore Hall presents Sophie Bevan & Ryan Wigglesworth. The British soprano’s recital brings two song cycles by French Romantic composers. Debussy’s Wagnerian influence can be felt in his settings of poetry by Charles Baudelaire. Berlioz’s six settings of Théophile Gautier poems, Les nuits d'été, were composed for piano and voice and later orchestrated by the Berlioz. Register, view here and on demand for 30 days. LIVE
** 12 pm ET: Boston Early Music Festival presents Ensemble Correspondances. Sébastien Daucé directs Ensemble Correspondances with mezzo-soprano Lucile Richardot in a program entitled “Perpetual Night: 17th-century Ayres and Songs”. Recorded December 8, 2020, at Théâtre des Bouffes du Nord, Paris, France. View here.
1 pm ET: IDAGIO Global Concert Hall presents The First Gala Concert of the Philharmonie de Paris. Khatia Buniatishvili is joined by Sabine Devieilhe, Angélique Kidjo, Edgar Moreau, Jean-Guihen Queyras, and other surprise guests along with the Orchestre des Jeunes Démos for a program of music by Gounod, Liszt, Rachmaninov, Franck, Dvorák, and more. All proceeds will be donated to the Démos project. Tickets from $13. View here. LIVE
1:30 pm ET: Bergen International Music Festival presents Johannes Weisser. Norwegian baritone Johannes Weisser performs Schumann's best-known song cycle, Dichterliebe, Mahler’s Rückert Lieder, and songs by Grieg, with pianist Christian Ihle Hadland. Tickets $30. View here until June 23.
3 pm ET: Bergen International Music Festival presents Luna Lab. Curated by Missy Mazzoli, BIT20 Ensemble from Bergen performs several compositions emerging from Luna Composition Lab, written by American composers aged between 15 and 20. The program also includes Enthusiasm Strategies, written by Mazzoli for the Kronos Quartet and their Fifty for the Future project, and Shaker Loops by John Adams. Tickets $30. View here until June 23.
** 5 pm ET: Spoleto Festival presents Chamber Music Program VII. Geoff Nuttall hosts highlights of the festival’s daily chamber music program including the premiere of Osvaldo Golijov’s Milonga with Alisa Weilerstein, cello and Inon Barnatan, piano, and the third movement of Beethoven’s Septet in E-flat, Op. 20. Written during the pandemic for cellist Alisa Weilerstein, Milonga stems from a melody made famous by violinist Jascha Heifetz, which Golijov reimagined and reconfigured, using it as a basis for a milonga—an Argentinian ballroom dance. View here until June 18.
6 pm ET: North South Music presents Funky Motives. Mezzo-soprano Margaret O’Connell sings Max Lifchitz’s song cycle Forget Me Not with the composer at the keyboard. Flutist Lisa Hansen plays Lifchitz’s Mosaico Latinoamericano and romantic miniatures by the Mexican composer Manuel M. Ponce. Jazz inspired works by Harry Bulow (Mixed Motives), Katrina Krimsky (Elise’s Dream), and Sarah Wallin-Huff (DodecaFunky) round up the program. Live from the National Opera Center. View here and on demand. LIVE
7:30 pm ET: Met Opera Streams presents Verdi’s Rigoletto. Starring Diana Damrau, Oksana Volkova, Piotr Beczala, Željko Lucic, and Štefan Kocán, conducted by Michele Mariotti. Production by Michael Mayer. From February 16, 2013. View here and for 24 hours.
7:30 pm ET: Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center presents Inside Chamber Music: Mozart's String Quartet in C, Dissonance. Bruce Adolphe is joined by Calidore String Quartet to examine Mozart's String Quartet in C, K. 465, Dissonance. The opening Adagio was so extraordinary and shocking for its time that several composers attempted to "correct" Mozart's "errors" and Haydn remarked, "If Mozart wrote it, he must have meant it." Adolphe takes a close look at the Adagio, the so-called corrected versions, and also the brilliant Allegro that follows. Tickets $15. View here and on demand for one week.
7:30 pm ET: Pittsburg Symphony presents Joshua Bell plays The Four Seasons. Bell returns to Heinz Hall as both violinist and leader in a program that begins with Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons, in its entirety. The orchestra’s cello section is featured in Piazzolla's “Primavera Porteño” (Spring) from The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires, and Chopin’s Nocturne in B-Flat Minor is performed in a new arrangement for Bell, cello ensemble and harp. In honor of the Piazzolla centenary, the program closes with "Verano Porteño” (Summer) from The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires. Tickets $15. View here until June 20.
8 pm ET: Boston Early Music Festival presents Doulce Mémoire. Denis Raisin Dadre directs Doulce Mémoire in a program entitled “Leonardo da Vinci: The Hidden Music.” Recorded at Château du Clos Lucé, Amboise, France. Tickets: $10. View here.
8 pm ET: Festival Casals presents Trío Sanromá. Trío Sanromá (Francisco Cabán, violin, Luis Miguel Rojas, cello, and Diana Figueroa, piano) play Quiñones’s Folié, Beethoven’s Piano Trio No. 4, Op. 11, Gassenhauer, Mendelssohn’s Piano Trio No. 1, Op. 49, and Del Águila’s Tango Trio. View here and on demand.
Artists and Organizations Offering Free Content
Academy of Ancient Music
The most listened-to period instrument ensemble, directed by Richard Egarr, has made a number of streams available on its website. Guest artists include Louise Alder, soprano, Nicola Benedetti, violin, Mary Bevan, soprano, David Blackadder, trumpet, Iestyn Davies, countertenor, Tim Mead, countertenor, Christopher Purvis, bass, and Tenebrae, directed by Nigel Short. Explore here.
Alternative Classical
Humans of Classical Music is a video series in which musicians, actors, comedians, and podcasters from around the world recommend their favorite piece of classical music in one minute. A new video will go live every Thursday during 2021, starting on February 4, accompanied with a link on Spotify. Each video is free of musical jargon and is suitable for anyone interested in exploring the world of classical music. The list includes countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo, three-time Edinburgh Comedy Award nominee Kieran Hodgson, Principal Conductor of Glyndebourne on Tour Ben Glassberg-Frost, Chief Executive of Manchester Collective Adam Szabo, and composers Anna Clyne, Gabriel Prokofiev, and Missy Mazzoli. Explore here.
American Opera Project
First Glimpse is a video album of 20 songs created during the first year of AOP’s 2019-21 fellowship program, Composers & the Voice. Originally intended as a live concert, the videos will be released every Friday beginning October 23 and for the following six weeks. The composers are Alaina Ferris, Matt Frey, Michael Lanci, Mary Prescott, Jessica Rudman and Tony Solitro, with librettists Amanda Hollander and Jonathan Douglass Turner. Videos will be free for one week following their release, after which they will be available to rent or purchase, individually or as a full set through AOP's Website. Explore here.
American Symphony Orchestra
American Symphony Orchestra releases weekly recordings from its archives with content alternating between live video recordings of SummerScape operas and audio recordings from previous ASO concerts. Ethel Smyth’s The Wreckers, Richard Strauss’s Die Liebe aus Danae, and Korngold’s Das Wunder der Heliane, all conducted by Leon Botstein, are all highly recommended and available now.
Apollo’s Fire: Music for the Soul
The Cleveland-based baroque orchestra founded by Artistic Director Jeannette Sorrell is offering a series of video streams entitled “Music for the Soul.” New episodes are posted here.
Baltimore Symphony Orchestra
BSO Sessions continues to bring the stories of BSO musicians, conductors, and collaborators to life through a documentary-style narrative. Real stories are paired with powerful music, including the elevation of unheard voices in classical music. Episodes premiere weekly on Wednesdays at 8 pm ET and are available through June 2021. Explore here.
Bard SummerScape & Fisher Center
Archival works highlight Bard’s wealth and breadth of programming, including performances from its SummerScape Opera and BMF archives. Recent include Bard SummerScape’s 2011 production of Strauss’s rarely performed Die Liebe der Danae and the Daniel Fish directed staging of Michael Gordon’s Acquanetta. More details here.
Bergen Philharmonic
Bergen’s outstanding orchestra enjoys national status in Norway with a history dating back to 1765. Its free streaming service was established as part of 250-year anniversary in 2015 and offers a fine selection of works from its concert series in Grieghallen, Bergen. Conductors include Edward Gardner, James Gaffigan, Thierry Fischer, David Zinman, Neeme Järvi, Jukka Pekka Saraste, Nathalie Stutzmann, and Christian Zacharias with soloists including Leif Ove Andsnes, Lise Davidsen, Truls Mørk, Mari Eriksmoen, and Freddy Kempf. Well worth exploring here.
Chatham Baroque
Chatham Baroque is releasing high-quality monthly videos featuring leading baroque performers including gambist Jaap ter Linden, lutenists Nigel North and Stephen Stubbs, and countertenor Reginald Mobley. Once posted, videos are available on demand through June 30, 2021. Each program includes artist interviews and are available for as little as $18 per program. Explore here.
Cliburn Kids
Cliburn Kids is a growing collection of entertaining 7- to 10-minute videos designed to introduce children to the fun of classical music. How does music paint pictures, tell stories, express feelings? Host Buddy Bray and guest artists use individual pieces to explore topics that delve into the way music is organized and structured, counting and rhythm, expressive elements, and sometimes just lighthearted enjoyment. Programs are geared towards elementary-aged children, and activities are provided for each episode that are perfect for in-classroom or at-home studies. New episodes and lesson plans are released every Tuesday. Explore here.
Days & Nights Festival
The annual multidisciplinary Days and Nights Festival—which since 2011 has taken place in and around Big Sur, California and has brought together luminaries and pioneers in fields including music, dance, theater, literature, film and the sciences—launches its premiere streaming portal featuring exclusive films of a selection of its landmark performances and events. Films slated for release, from February to May 2021, includes contributions by such wide-ranging figures as JoAnne Akalaitis, Tibetan artist Tenzin Choegyal, Danny Elfman, Molissa Fenley, María Irene Fornés, Allen Ginsberg, Dev Hynes (Blood Orange), Jerry Quickley, and Glass himself. Featured performers and ensembles include Dennis Russell Davies, Ira Glass, Matt Haimovitz, Tara Hugo, Lavinia Meijer, Maki Namekawa, Gregory Purnhagen, Third Coast Percussion, Opera Parallèle, and Glass and his Philip Glass Ensemble. Explore here.
Detroit Symphony Orchestra
The Detroit Symphony Orchestra has made its webcast archive available for free. The collection features 200+ works going back three years, and highlights include Leonard Slatkin conducting John Luther Adams’s climate change-inspired Become Ocean from 2019, several world premieres, and a host of bite-sized encores. Explore here.
Deutsche Grammophon Yellow Lounge
The German classical music giant is streaming Yellow Lounge broadcasts from its archives. Recent additions include clarinetist Andreas Ottensamer, pianists Alice Sara Ott and Chihiro Yamanaka, and cellist Mischa Maisky. Performances are broadcast in rotation, one video at a time, adding a new performance every few days. DG communicates the start of each new performance by newsletter at the start of each week. To keep updated sign up here.
English Symphony Orchestra
The English Symphony Orchestra’s ESO Digital is an expanding digital archive of music, performed by English Symphony Orchestra and its partners, that you are unlikely to hear anywhere else. Access is free with a monthly donation; however Musical America readers can get a free trial of one week when setting up a new donation by using the coupon code MusicalAmerica2021. Register here.
Finnish National Opera
Finnish National Opera presents Stage24, a series of streamed archived performances on its website, which are then available for the next six months. Recent content includes a staged version of Sibelius’s Kullervo, Stravinsky’s The Rake’s Progress, Caspar Holten’s staging of Wagner’s Der Fliegende Holländer with Camilla Nylund, and Christoff Loy’s Tosca. An excellent company and some interesting and original work worth investigating. Explore here.
Gina Bachauer Piano Competitions
Postponed from 2020, the Solo Rounds will now be conducted through video recordings, presented online. Twenty-three Junior Competitors ages 11-14 and twenty-one Young Artists Competitors ages 15-18 will continue their quest for medals and their share of $62,000 in cash prizes. Hailing from 14 countries, these young international pianists will each vie for the title of the next Gina Bachauer Gold Medalist. Chosen from an original pool of 220 applicants, 113 pianists performed in the Preliminary Rounds, with each competitor presenting a 30-minute program in one of five international cities: Hamburg, Moscow, Shanghai, New York City, and Salt Lake City. The Gina Bachauer Junior International Piano Competition will take place June 13-19 and the Gina Bachauer Young Artists International Piano Competition will take place June 20-26. Explore here.
Handel and Haydn Society
Boston’s Handel and Haydn Society has created the H+H Listening Room where you can hear and watch H+H performances including Mozart’s Requiem, Handel’s Messiah, and Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas filmed at New York’s Met Museum. There are also more than a dozen videos of musicians performing from their homes, a special video of principal flutist Emi Ferguson teaching people how to make their own baroque flute, and a new podcast called “Tuning In”. In the first episode Principal Cellist Guy Fishman interviews Artistic Director Harry Christophers about Bach's St. Matthew Passion. Explore here.
Kennedy Center: Arts Across America: Spring
Arts across America continues this Spring with a focus on cultural leadership and art as a catalyst for public healing, decolonization, and genuine global change. With artistic contributions from the Black Trans theater community, programs about Sacrifice Zones and the environment, the fight for women’s rights in the Latinx community, and discussions of the prisons and detention center system, and about the importance of Indigenous food and health. Hosted by sage artistic minds, these performances and conversations strive to bring audiences together to heal our country, communities, and selves. Explore here and other Kennedy Center regular online releases via their digital stage here.
La Scala/RAI
Italy’s RAI presents five productions from La Scala Milan including the world premiere of Kurtág’s Fin de Partie, Daniel Barenboim conducting Götterdämmerung, Lisette Oropesa in Verdi’s I Masnadieri, Montedervi’s Orfeo conducted by Rinaldo Alessandrini, and Les Vêpres Siciliennes conducted by Daniele Gatti. A wide range of concerts are also available. Explore and register here.
Les Arts Florissants
Les Arts Florissants’s annual Festival in Thiré, France included a series of 10- to 15-minute “Meditation” concerts recorded earlier this summer. Now available to enjoy online, the Meditations include performances by students of Juilliard’s Historical Performance program in the spirit of their annual participation in the Festival. View here.
Lincoln Center Lincoln Center Passport to the Arts
A variety of virtual classes, performances, and bonus content designed for children, teens and adults with disabilities and their families. Offerings include programs with Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, Jazz at Lincoln Center, the Metropolitan Opera Guild, New York City Ballet, the New York Philharmonic, and The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts. Families can attend dance, music or drama classes, watch exclusive performances, check out behind-the-scenes content, and even meet performers—all from their homes. Families will receive pre-visit materials, including social narratives, photos, and links before each program. All programs take place via Zoom. Register here.
Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra
LACO AT HOME offers streaming and on demand performances, including a full showing of the orchestra’s critically acclaimed West Coast premiere of Dark with Excessive Bright for double bass and strings by LACO Artist-in-Residence Missy Mazzoli. View streaming here and on demand here.
Los Angeles Master Chorale
Videos recorded as part of the “Offstage with the Los Angeles Master Chorale” series from April 24 to June 19, 2020 included interviews conducted by Artistic Director Grant Gershon and Associate Conductor Jenny Wong with notable performers—including special guests Reena Esmail, Morten Lauridsen, Anna Schubert, Peter Sellars, Derrick Spiva—as well as Master Chorale singers. Available on demand here.
Mark Morris Dance Group 40th Anniversary Digital Season
MMDG continues to celebrate its 40th Anniversary with a new archival collection featuring three excerpts from Mark Morris dances?I Don’t Want to Love, Rhymes With Silver, and V, and one full-length work, Rock of Ages, selected by veteran MMDG company members Joe Bowie and Lauren Grant. Viewers are also able to watch the full performances of the excerpted works on demand. Each work is preceded by video introductions by Joe Bowie and Lauren Grant. Explore here.
Metropolitan Opera Live In Schools
The Metropolitan Opera’s HD Live in Schools program has launched a new series for the 2020–21 school year, creating cross-disciplinary educational opportunities across the country. For the 2020–21 school year, students and teachers will receive free subscriptions to the Met Opera on Demand service, with a catalogue of more than 700 Live in HD presentations, classic telecasts, and radio broadcasts. Ten operas have been selected for the HD Live in Schools program, and will be presented in five educational units, with two thematically paired operas per unit. The series opens with Beethoven’s Fidelio and Donizetti’s La Fille du Régiment (September 28–October 16), both of which explore the intersection of music and politics. The Met will continue to offer teachers HD Live in Schools Educator Guides and access to Google Classroom materials that can be adapted for virtual learning lesson plans. In addition, the Met’s National Educators Conference will be hosted on a virtual platform this year and take place on five Saturdays throughout the 2020–21 school year. Two conferences, scheduled for October 10, 2020, and October 17, 2020, will also feature live conversations with Met artists. More information here.
Minnesota Orchestra
Minnesota Orchestra at Home shares video, audio, and educational materials through the categories of Watch, Listen and Learn, including videos from the orchestra’s archives and newly created “mini-concerts” directly from the homes of Orchestra musicians. Explore and view here.
National Sawdust Digital Discovery Festival, Volume One
With more than 65 events, featuring over 100 artists premiering in a four-month span, National Sawdust Digital Discovery Festival: Volume One was a bright spot in NYC's post-COVID live music world. Featuring post-COVID performances from Robert Wilson, Julian Lage, Tyondai Braxton, Emel Mathlouthi, Matthew Whitaker, Dan Tepfer, Ashley Bathgate, Emily Wells, Brooklyn Rider, Joel Ross, Conrad Tao, Andrew Yee, and Lucy Dhegrae, and recently recorded Masterclasses with Tania León, Ted Hearne, Vijay Iyer, Jamie Barton, Lawrence Brownlee, Trimpin, and Lara St. John. Archival performances include David Byrne, Lara Downes and Rhiannon Giddens, and Ryuichi Sakamoto. Explore here.
Next Festival of Emerging Artists
The 2021 Virtual Festival will take place June 8 – July 1, 2021. 25 festival fellows—young musicians, composers, and choreographers, ages 20-30—will attend the full festival of masterclasses, workshops, and virtual collaborations and select events will be free for the general public to attend. May 25 is the deadline for fellow applications, which are available at www.next-fest.org. Festival events will be held on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays and the schedule will be organized into the following themes: Business & Entrepreneurship (June 8-10), Social Justice & Activism (June 15-17), Artistry & Musicality (June 22-24), and Multidisciplinary Collaboration (June 29-July 1). Guest artists include cellist Seth Parker Woods (University of Chicago); composer Gabriela Lena Frank (Gabriela Lena Frank Creative Arts Academy); composer/violist Jessica Meyer; Aizuri Quartet; double bassist Chi-chi Nwanoku (Chineke!); violinist David Radzynski (Concertmaster, Israel Philharmonic); hornist/composer Jeff Scott (Imani Winds, Oberlin Conservatory); composer Derek Bermel (American Composers Orchestra); conductor/composer Peter Askim (Next Festival’s Artistic Director); and more. Explore here.
New World Symphony
The New World Symphony presents a web-based series called NWS Archive+. Michael Tilson Thomas moderates discussions with NWS Fellows, alumni, guest artists, and visiting faculty about archived recordings. Performances will be available here. NWS Fellows also play live, informal chamber music concerts from their homes in Miami Beach and broadcast via Facebook Live. In addition, the NWS online archive contains master classes, tutorials and town halls, which can be found here. Finally, for the past 10 years, the Fellows have performed one-hour concerts for local school children. These concerts and preparatory material will be available free to students and parents. NWS Educational concerts can be found here.
New York Opera Fest
The New York Opera Fest celebrates its sixth season with both virtual and in-person performances by 20+ local, New York City-based opera companies. Presented by the New York Opera Alliance, with support from OPERA America, this annual festival runs for two months May-June 2021 starting with a special kick-off event April 29th. For a complete list of events, explore here.
Opera Australia
OA | TV: Opera Australia on Demand is the Sydney-based company’s new digital space. Alongside the world’s largest collection of Dame Joan Sutherland on video, OA will offer exclusive content from the OA back catalogue, productions from Handa Opera on Sydney Harbour, and a new series of chat show-style interviews conducted by AD Lyddon Terracini. The first posted full show is Sutherland in The Merry Widow, and the fileted aria’s in the section labelled “The Best of Dame Joan Sutherland” are even better. View here.
Opéra National de Paris
The Palais Garnier and Bastille Opera have made their digital stage, “The 3e Scène,” free. The platform is a pure place of artistic adventure and exploration, giving free rein to photographers, filmmakers, writers, illustrators, visual artists, composers, and choreographers to create original works. Visit here. Some of Opéra National de Paris’s productions are accessible on the company’s Facebook Page. In addition, Octave, the Paris Opera’s online magazine, is posting articles, videos, and interviews here.
Opera North
One of Britain’s most respected smaller opera companies, Opera North has put its acclaimed semi-staged concerts of Wagner’s epic Ring Cycle online. “Beg, borrow, or be like Wotan and steal a ticket for this show,” said the UK’s Times of Das Rheingold. “You’d be lucky to hear as good at Bayreuth,” said The Telegraph of Die Walküre. Richard Farnes proves a seriously impressive Wagner conductor. Watch here.
OperaVision
OperaVision offers livestreams of operas available for free and online for up to six months. Previous offerings include Barrie Kosky’s visually spectacular Moses und Aron, David McVicar’s superb Die Entführung aus dem Serail from Glyndebourne, and Deborah Warner’s thoughtful Death in Venice for English National Opera. View upcoming and past content here.
Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra: Beethoven at Home
RPO brought Beethoven to living rooms in December playing all nine symphonies. The musicians performed the first eight symphonies in small chamber ensembles varying from a string sextet to a 15-strong brass ensemble. The Grand Finale took place on New Year’s Eve: Beethoven’s Ninth, played by the full orchestra with chorus and soloists. View here.
Orli Shaham Bach Yard Playdates
Pianist Orli Shaham brings her acclaimed interactive concert series for kids to the internet. Bach Yard Playdates introduces musical concepts, instruments, and the experience of concert-going to a global audience of children and their families. A number of 10-minute episodes are already available for on-demand streaming. Programs and performances range from Bach’s Two-Part Invention to Steve Reich’s Clapping Music. Explore here.
Trinity Wall Street
New York’s Trinity Church Wall Street introduces daily weekday “Comfort at One” (1 pm ET) streaming performances on Facebook with full videos posted here. Tune in for encore performances of favorite Trinity concerts, professionally filmed in HD, along with current at-home performances from Trinity’s extended artistic family.
Voices of Ascension
New York choir Voices of Ascension, which celebrates its 30th anniversary next season, is posting a daily offering of choral beauty on its website. Music is chosen by staff, members of the chorus and orchestra, and listeners. View here.
Warsaw Philharmonic
The Warsaw Philharmonic has made a selection of video recordings available on its YouTube channel. Recent offerings include Saint-Saëns’s Organ Symphony and Arvo Pärt’s Swansong conducted by Artistic Director Andrzej Boreyko, as well as rarities by Polish composers like Grazyna Bacewicz. It’s an excellent orchestra very much in the Eastern European tradition and concerts have been master edited for posting online.
Paid Digital Arts Services
Berlin Philharmonic Digital Concert Hall
The BPO Digital Concert Hall contains over 600 orchestra concerts covering more than ten years, including 15 concerts with the orchestra’s new Chief Conductor Kirill Petrenko, interviews, backstage footage. Subscriptions or single tickets available.
Medici TV
Thousands of classical music videos are available by subscription, as well as hundreds of events that are broadcast live for free each year, available for 90 days. Subscriptions cost $83.85 per year but single tickets are also available. www.medici.tv
Opera Philadelphia Channel
Opera Philadelphia has created its own channel through which to share its digital offering. Operatic films like David T. Little’s Soldier Songs, world premiere digital commissions by Tyshawn Sorey, Courtney Bryan, Angélica Negrón, and Caroline Shaw, and recordings of stage productions like La Traviata and Breaking the Waves are available on-demand. Season subscriptions priced at $99 are offered along with pay-per-view rentals for individual performances. The channel is available on computers and mobile devices, as well as AppleTV, Android TV, Roku, and Amazon FireTV. Explore here.
Pictured from the top
Lucia Lucas in Tulsa Opera Don Giovanni
Jordi Savall
Harlem Quartet
WHO'S BLOGGING
Law and Disorder by GG Arts Law
Career Advice by Legendary Manager Edna Landau
An American in Paris by Frank Cadenhead