Boston Classical Review

Andris Nelsons with lead his final season as music director of the Boston Symphony Orchestra in 2026-27. Photo: Hilary Scott

The Boston Symphony Orchestra announced its 2026-27 schedule this week. Music director Andris Nelsons, whose term at the orchestra’s helm will end in August 2027, leads fifteen weeks of concerts, starting with a September 17 gala featuring Yo-Yo Ma and concluding with a standalone performance of Mahler’s Symphony No. 3 on April 17.

In between, Nelsons revisits various monuments of the repertoire, including Beethoven’s Symphonies Nos. 5 and 7, Strauss’s Eine Alpensinfonie, and complete performances of Stravinsky’s three ballets for Serge Diaghilev (The Firebird, Petrushka, and The Rite of Spring). He also finishes his traversal of Mahler’s nine completed symphonies with the BSO, directing performances of the Symphony No. 7 in September.

One of the standout features of Nelsons’ time in Boston has been his championing of a refreshingly non-dogmatic body of new music. Next season continues this tradition, with the conductor leading premieres of works by Sofia Gubaidulina, Francisco Coll, Carlos Simon, and Unsuk Chin.

Much of the season is organized around a series of themes: “Technology & Our Humanity,” “Creation,” “Tchaikovsky,” and “Stravinsky.” The former involves Nelsons conducting a complete cycle of the Tchaikovsky symphonies in January and concludes with concert performances of the opera The Queen of Spades, starring Kristine Opolais and David Butt Philip.

The “Creation Focus” includes the November premiere of Osvaldo Golijov and David Henry Hwang’s evening-length Creation, conducted by Eric Jacobsen. The new work is prefaced the week before by the BSO’s first performance in almost thirty years of Haydn’s iconic oratorio, The Creation. Meantime, Tod Machover’s already and not yet anchors the orchestra’s week-long “Technology” festival.

Other guest conductors next season include Susanna Mälkki, Kent Nagano, Philippe Jordan, and Dennis Russell Davies. Kazuki Yamada and Paavo Järvi make their Symphony Hall debuts while Jakub Hrůša is back in April to direct works by Suk, Martinů, and Brahms. Joana Mallwitz closes the BSO’s season in May.

Soloists appearing during the 2026-27 season include pianists Emanuel Ax, Seong-Jin Cho, Kirill Gerstein, Jan Lisiecki, Jean-Yves Thibaudet, Lang Lang, and Alexandre Kantorow.

Visiting string players include the BSO’s new artist-in-residence, cellist Alisa Weilerstein, who plays Prokofiev’s Sinfonia Concertante in February. Other highlights involve violinist Hilary Hahn and cellist Seth Parker Woods teaming up for the local premiere of composer chair Carlos Simon’s Double Concert Suite and Renaud Capuçon playing Philip Glass’s Violin Concerto No. 1 (in honor of that composer’s 90^th birthday). In March, teenaged prodigy Himari performs Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 2 and, in May, Joshua Bell joins the BSO for Bruch’s Violin Concerto No. 1.

The Boston Symphony Chamber Players present their usual tetrad of concerts in October, January, February, and May—all at Jordan Hall.

In addition to their Symphony Hall dates, Nelsons and the BSO return to Carnegie Hall for concerts in April and also embark on a week-long European tour over the first part of March.

Subscription sales and renewals are now available. Single tickets go on sale July 31. bso.org

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