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TICKET INFORMATION

WEEKEND CONCERT SERIES IN CALDERWOOD HALL

SEATING SECTIONS AND RATES

Performance Level

and First Balcony:

Members

$65

Adults

$85

Seniors

$75

Students & Children

ages 5–17 $20

Second Balcony:

Members

$50

Adults

$65

Seniors

$55

Students & Children

ages 5–17 $20

MEMBER CONCERT PRESALE AUGUST 6–12

Third Balcony:

Members

$40

Adults

$50

Seniors

$45

Students & Children

ages 5–17 $20

Purchase tickets before they become available to the general public on August 13, 2025.

NOT A MEMBER?

Join today for discounts and exclusive experiences: gardnermuseum.org/join-give.

To receive monthly updates about concerts, performances, and more, visit gardnermuseum.org/signup.

Members receive early access to concert tickets.

Learn more and buy tickets at gardnermuseum.org/about/music. Or call the Box Office at 617 278 5156. Open daily from 10 AM–4 PM.

Open until 6 PM on Thursdays; closed Tuesdays.

18TH-CENTURY VIOLA D’AMORE

Composer and violinist Charles Martin Loeffler gifted this instrument to Isabella Stewart Gardner at the opening of the Museum in 1903, where it is now on permanent display in the Yellow Room. The viola d’amore is said to have developed from Middle Eastern antecedents (as its “flaming sword” sound holes might suggest), with seven bowed strings and seven more underneath, which pass through holes in the bridge and resonate sympathetically. Rachel Barton Pine will perform using the Gardner’s viola d’amore on October 26, 2025.

MESSAGE

FROM

GEORGE STEEL

ABRAMS CURATOR OF MUSIC

I am delighted to share the details of our Fall 2025 season with you. We open with a bang—Bach’s complete Brandenburg Concertos played by period-instrument superstars ACRONYM. If you’re not already a member, I hope you’ll become one and receive early access to tickets, discounts, and other benefits. The support of our audiences makes these concerts possible.

Thank you,

George Steel Abrams Curator of Music

Additional information about seating sections and policies is available online.

Concert programs and COVID guidelines are subject to change; please see the website for up-to-date information.

Saturday, September 13, and Sunday, September 14, 2025, at 1:30 PM

ACRONYM

J.S. Bach’s Complete Brandenburg Concertos (1721)

The period-instrument superstars ACRONYM open the Gardner Music season playing all six Brandenburg Concertos on plusieurs instruments, as Bach wrote on the title page: flutes, recorders, trumpets, hunting horns, gambas, and violins of every size, a motley “kitchen” of continuo instruments, and more! In anticipation of overwhelming demand, the whole set will be performed twice: once on Saturday and once on Sunday. This one’s not to be missed!

Music at the Gardner is supported by Nora McNeely Hurley / Manitou Fund. The Museum thanks its generous concert donors: The Coogan Concert in memory of Peter Weston Coogan; Fitzpatrick Family Concert; James Lawrence Memorial Concert; Alford P. Rudnick Memorial Concert; David Scudder in memory of his wife, Marie Louise Scudder; Wendy Shattuck Young Artist Concert; and Willona Sinclair Memorial Concert. The piano is dedicated as the Alex d’Arbeloff Steinway. The harpsichord was generously donated by Dr. Robert Barstow in memory of Marion Huse, and its care is endowed in memory of Dr. Barstow by The Barstow Fund. Music at the Gardner is also supported in part by Barbara and Amos Hostetter, Nicie and Jay Panetta, and the Massachusetts Cultural Council, which is supported by the state of Massachusetts and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Sunday, September 21, 2025, at 1:30 PM

John Zorn

Philosophical Investigations I (2022)

I Am Your Labyrinth… (2022)

Philosophical Investigations II (2024) But Doth Suffer a Sea-Change (2025)

Notes on the Assumption of Mystical Solidarity Approaching Nine Neological Approximations Illuminating the Eternal Return of the Same (2025) with special guests Jorge Roeder, bass, and Ches Smith, drums

JUNCTION TRIO

PLAYS JOHN ZORN

The superb Junction Trio perform the vivid and virtuosic chamber music of John Zorn. Zorn concerts at the Gardner have become audience favorites. His fearsomely difficult and theatrical music pushes musicians to their utter limits and leaves listeners dazzled and moved.

Junction Trio is: Stefan Jackiw, violin | Jay Campbell, cello | Conrad Tao, piano

Sunday, September 28, 2025, at 1:30 PM

Joseph Bologne Six Concertante Quartets, No. 2 in G minor (1777)

Ludwig van Beethoven String Quartet No. 15 in A minor, Op. 132 (1825)

Dora Pejačević String Quartet in C major, Op. 58 (1922)

CATALYST

STRING QUARTET

The terrific Catalyst Quartet returns to the Gardner after an astonishing debut last season. They perform works by the legendary violinist and composer Joseph Bologne. A superb swordsman and swashbuckling hero, he led an all-Black regiment in the French Revolution. The Catalysts will introduce Gardner audiences to the splendid string quartet by the late-Romantic Croatian composer Dora Pejačević. Beethoven’s monumental penultimate quartet fills out the balance of the program.

Catalyst String Quartet is: Karla Donehew Perez, violin | Abi Fayette, violin | Paul Laraia, viola | Karlos Rodriguez, cello

Sunday, October 5, 2025, at 1:30 PM

José White Lafitte La Bella Cubana (1910)

Manuel Ponce Estrellita (1912)

Sergei Prokofiev Piano Sonata No. 7 “Stalingrad,” arr. R. Rengel (1942)

William Grant Still Suite for Cello (1943)

Alberto Ginastera Finale from Concerto for Strings, Op. 33 (1966)

Clarice Assad Dança Brasileira (2008)

Perpetual Motion (2008)

Quenton Blache A Vision for Peace (2025)

Jessie Montgomery New Commission (2025)

SPHINX VIRTUOSI

WITH STERLING ELLIOTT, CELLO

The blazing 22-member Sphinx Virtuosi returns to the Gardner Museum with works from across the Americas—from the biracial Cuban violinist and composer (with a trilingual name) José White Lafitte, to Argentine modernist Alberto Ginastera, to Mexican Manuel Ponce. The performance includes two Boston premieres and the return of the wonderful American cellist Sterling Elliott after his triumph last season. Sphinx visits are invariably ear-opening and roof-raising.

Sunday, October 19, 2025, at 1:30 PM

MIRANDA CUCKSON, VIOLIN

BLAIR MCMILLEN, PIANO

Sunday, October 26, 2025, at 1:30 PM

RACHEL BARTON PINE, VIOLIN AND VIOLA D’AMORE

Ludwig van Beethoven Violin Sonata No. 8 in G major, Op. 30, No. 3 (1802)

Lili Boulanger D’un matin de printemps (1917–18)

Ross Lee Finney Fiddle-doodle-ad (1945)

Sergei Prokofiev Violin Sonata No. 1 in F minor, Op. 80 (1946)

Eleanor Alberga The Wild Blue Yonder (1995)

A musician’s musician, the great Miranda Cuckson comes to the Gardner Museum with a program that comprises nearly 200 years of violin music, from Beethoven to the Jamaican–British Alberga. A thrilling mix of astringent modernism and earthy Russianism, Prokofiev’s first violin sonata is an ideal showcase for Cuckson’s virtuosity and range of expressive colors.

Johannes Brahms Violin Sonata (1886)

Pablo de Sarasate Introduction and Tarantella for Violin, Op. 43 (1900)

Charles Martin Loeffler Mescolanza “Olla Podrida” for Viola D’Amore and Piano (after 1900)

Norske Land for Viola D’Amore and Piano (by 1929)

Last year, Rachel Barton Pine took a thrilling “test-drive” on the Gardner Museum’s extraordinary 1770s viola d’amore. Delighted with the exceptional and rare instrument, she is returning to play a recital on violin and the Gardner’s viola d’amore. Championed by composers as varied as Vivaldi, Haydn, and Bernstein, the viola d’amore developed from roots in Middle Eastern music.

Sunday, November 2, 2025, at 1:30 PM Marin Marais Les Folies d’Espagne (1701)

J. B. Boismortier Sonata No. 1 in G major, Op. 51 (1734)

J. S. Bach Sonata sopr’il soggetto Reale from The Musical Offering, BWV 1079 (1747)

CLAIRE CHASE, FLUTES,

WITH AISSLINN NOSKY, VIOLIN KATINKA KLEIJN, CELLO

ALEX PEH, PIANO AND HARPSICHORD

Olivier Messiaen Le Merle Noir (1952)

Tania Léon Ritual (1987)

Kaija Saariaho Mirrors (1997)

Marcos Balter Alone (2013)

Michael Oesterle Stand Still, mvt. 3 (2013)

Tania Léon Singsong (2023, rev. 2025)

MacArthur Fellow (and Harvard Professor of the Practice) Claire Chase comes to the Museum with a program that alternates Baroque music with 20th- and 21st-century works. One of the world’s great recitalists and champions of flute music is joined by distinguished colleagues on period instruments in this fascinating program.

This performance is made possible by the Anne Hawley Fund for Programs.

Sunday, November 9, 2025, at 1:30 PM

CLAYTON STEPHENSON, PIANO

J. S. Bach Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring, arr. Hess (1723/1926)

Franz Schubert Four Impromptus, D. 899, Op. 90 (1827)

Isaac Albéniz Iberia, Book 1 (1906)

Igor Stravinsky Three Movements from Petrushka (1921)

George Gershwin Rhapsody in Blue (1924)

Winner of the 2025 Sphinx Medal, and recent Harvard and NEC graduate, Clayton Stephenson, makes his Gardner Museum debut in a program of brilliant music that will showcase his extraordinary playing and his beautiful interpretive gifts.

Sunday, November 16, 2025, at 1:30 PM

SASHA COOKE, MEZZO SOPRANO, WITH MYRA HUANG, PIANO

Antonín Dvořák Goin’ Home (1893/1922)

Erich Korngold Abschiedslieder, Op. 14 (1920–21)

Kurt Weill Youkali (1934)

I’m a Stranger Here Myself (1943) Stay Well (1949)

Aaron Copland Nature, the Gentlest Mother (1950)

Samuel Barber The Monk and His Cat (1953)

H. Leslie Adams Prayer (1961)

Leonard Bernstein A Simple Song (1978)

Michael Tilson Thomas Not Everyone Thinks That I’m Beautiful (1985)

John Musto Litany (1987)

Jake Heggie In the Beginning (1999)

John Kander A Letter from Sullivan Ballou (1999)

Lowell Liebermann Two Worlds, Op. 80, No. 6 (2002)

Pierre Jalbert Slumber My Darling (2015)

Carlos Simon Prayer (2018)

Jennifer Higdon Summer Hue (2021)

Jasmine Barnes World-premiere Gardner co-commission (2025)

One of America’s greatest mezzo-sopranos Sasha Cooke takes a night off from the global operatic stage to bring the Gardner Museum a program of American songs, including a Museumcommissioned world premiere from Jasmine Barnes. Cooke’s program is the perfect upbeat to the country’s imminent semiquincentennial.

This concert is made possible by the generous support of David Scudder in memory of his wife, Marie Louise Scudder.

Sunday, November 23, 2025, at 1:30 PM

Felix Mendelssohn Fantasie in F-sharp minor, Op. 28 (1833)

Frédéric Chopin Ballade No. 3 in A-flat major, Op. 47 (1841)

Franz Liszt Mephisto Waltz No. 1, S. 514 (about 1862)

Florence Price Sonata in E minor (1932)

Joel Thompson “My Dungeon Shook” from Three American Preludes (2020)

MICHELLE CANN, PIANO

Pianist Michelle Cann has been making waves across the country, winning two GRAMMY® Awards for her recordings of the music of Florence Price. Her program for the Gardner features dazzling music from pianistcomposers, including Price’s Sonata in E minor. She will play three glorious 19th-century showpieces from Romantic greats—Mendelssohn, who dedicated his three-movement Fantasie to the great Ignaz Moscheles, and Liszt and Chopin, who were their own most famous interpreters. Liszt’s Mephisto Waltz No. 1 depicts the waltz in the village inn from the 1836 Faust of Nikolaus Lenau and represents Liszt at his glittering best. Joel Thompson is an Atlanta-based pianist-composer whose work takes its title from James Baldwin.

ISABELLA STEWART GARDNER MUSEUM 25 EVANS WAY

BOSTON, MA 02115

WWW.GARDNERMUSEUM.ORG

Member Presale Starts August 6

COVER: Tomaso Eberle (Naples, 1725–1792), Viola d’Amore, about 1770–1779.

Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston

INSIDE: George Steel, Abrams Curator of Music, photo by Whitney Lawson; ACRONYM, photo by Jeff Weeks; Junction Trio, photo by Shervin Lainez; Catalyst String Quartet, photo by Ricardo Quiñones; Sphinx Virtuosi, photo by Scott Jackson; Sterling Elliott, photo by Denny Moes Media House; Miranda Cuckson, photo by John Rogers; Blair McMillen, photo by Keiko Nagata; Rachel Barton Pine, photo by Lisa-Marie Mazzucco; Claire Chase, photo by Carrie Schneider; Aisslinn Nosky, photo by Matthew Marigold; Katinka Kleijn, photo by Paul Elledge; Alex Peh, courtesy of Alex Peh; Clayton Stephenson, photo by Chris McGuire; Sasha Cooke, photo by Stephanie Girard; Michelle Cann, photo by Titilayo Ayangade.