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There will be plenty of classical music staples such as Mozart, Beethoven, and Brahms when the Aspen Music Festival launches its 77th season on July 1. Spicing up the calendar, announced Tuesday for the 7 1\/2-week festival, will be a tasty combination of fresh new works, new faces, and lots of American music.<\/p>\n
As 2026 is the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, this season\u2019s theme is American music. Aside from music by such familiar American composers as Leonard Bernstein, Charles Ives and Aaron Copland, the season offers works by other composers inspired by things American, among them Antonin Dvo\u0159\u00e1k\u2019s \u201cFrom The New World\u201d symphony and Sergei Rachmaninoff\u2019s Piano Concerto No. 4 (written when the ex-Pat Russian composer was resident in Beverly Hills).<\/p>\n
The opening days feature an impressive list of starry American soloists. Pianist Joyce Yang kicks things off with a recital on July 1, followed by the great baritone Thomas Hampson\u2019s recital on July 2. A Chamber Symphony program on July 3 offers a new work by the brilliant opera composer Jake Heggie that features countertenor Key\u2019mon W. Murrah (who made a splash at the festival in recent years), and Sunday\u2019s Festival Orchestra is all-American, with Hampson and soprano Ren\u00e9e Fleming singing excerpts from John Adams\u2019 groundbreaking opera Nixon in China. The festival\u2019s music director,r Robert Spano, conducts.<\/p>\n
The season finale\u00a0on August 23 promises more vocal excellence with Spano leading Beethoven\u2019s Symphony No. 9, preceded by Bernstein\u2019s glorious Chichester Psalms, featuring Murrah.<\/p>\n
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As Alan Fletcher transitions to emeritus after 21 seasons as the festival\u2019s president, on paper, this final season might be his best. Fletcher and Patrick Chamberlain, vice president for artistic administration, have assembled an eye-popping lineup of soloists in recitals, chamber music, operas, and orchestra performances, and some creative programs for them.<\/p>\n
Piano fans might want to circle the week of July 27 on their calendars, when two of the world\u2019s greatest pianists each perform twice. Yuja Wang, who was a student here in Aspen before she became the superstar she is now, returns to play a program with the Latin percussion group People of Earth on July 29 and the Barber piano concerto with the Chamber Orchestra on August 1. French star Jean-Yves Thibaudot presents an all-Debussy recital on July 27 and tops off the week with George Gershwin\u2019s Concerto in F on August 2.<\/p>\n
Other pianists with recitals worth noting include Marc-Andr\u00e9 Hamelin, Daniil Trifonov, Simone Dinnerstein, Emanuel Ax, and Aspen\u2019s own Anton Nel. In a particularly engaging idea for a program on July 11, Aspen regular Inon Barnatan offers his \u201cTime Traveler\u2019s Suite,\u201d focusing on music that looks back on earlier eras for inspiration.<\/p>\n
Among violinists, headliners Augustin Hadelich and Gil Shaham return for both recitals and performances with orchestras.<\/p>\n
Hadelich plays Samuel Barber\u2019s violin concerto on July 19, arguably the greatest by an American composer, on a particularly fascinating Festival Orchestra program July 19 that includes the world premiere of Matthew Aucoin\u2019s Symphony No. 1. His recital earlier in the week has him leading Tchaikovsky\u2019s Souvenir de Florence sextet, always a crowd-pleaser.<\/p>\n
In three August recitals, Gil Shaham plays all nine Beethoven violin sonatas before taking on Indian-American composer Reena Esmail\u2019s concerto for violin and piano on August 14 with his sister Orli Shaham at the keyboard. Other notable violin recitalists are Leonidas Kavakos and two new faces to Aspen: Giovanni Andrea Zanon and Maria Due\u00f1as.<\/p>\n
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Several projects involving the Aspen Opera Theatre and VocalARTS program, headed by Fleming and conductor Patrick Summers, are especially enticing. In July, Britten\u2019s juicy and highly approachable setting of Shakespeare\u2019s A Midsummer Night\u2019s Dream tops the list, with countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo in the scene-stealing role of Puck. No doubt\u00a0he will be singing Oberon. Jane Glover conducts at the Wheeler Opera House.<\/p>\n
In August, a semi-staged production of Mozart\u2019s Magic Flute<\/em> comes to the Music Tent, Summers conducting. A third opera, Sara Kirkland Snider\u2019s ethereal Hildegarde<\/em>, which was a sensation in its Los Angeles premiere in November, gets a performance in Harris Hall with the Aspen Contemporary Ensemble under Timothy Weiss.<\/p>\n Opera arias also populate lyric tenor Lawrence Brownlee and soprano Erin Morley\u2019s recital on August 4 with Myra Huang on piano. Joyce DiDonato is in recital with Spano on piano on July 15.<\/p>\n Conductors returning include David Robertson, James Gaffigan, Rafael Payare, Cristian M\u0103celaru, and James Conlon. One highlight should be Leonard Slatkin on August 7, leading the Chamber Symphony in his Schubertiade (and the New World Symphony). Also juicy: St\u00e9phane Den\u00e9ve on the August 9 program of new works by Carlos Simon and Jessie Montgomery, plus\u00a0 Mahler\u2019s Symphony No. 1.<\/p>\n Following previous years\u2019 outdoor site performances of music by John Luther Adams comes Caroline Shaw\u2019s Brush, <\/em>which stations musicians along a trail for the sounds to emerge as one walks. Teddy Abrams, who conducted the 2021 premiere in Oregon, leads the music on July 30.<\/p>\n Tickets for these and dozens of other programs go on sale in April. Fuller details are available in the season calendar on the festival\u2019s website.<\/p>\n Harvey Steiman has been writing about the Aspen Music Festival for more than 30 years<\/em>.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n