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2018-2019 at the Celebrity Series of Boston

clockwise from top left: Alisa Weilerstein; Philharmonix; Joyce DiDonato; So Percussion; Michael Tilson Thomas
clockwise from top left: Alisa Weilerstein (credit Decca/Harald Hoffman); Philharmonix (credit Max Parovsky); Joyce DiDonato (credit Simon Pauly); So Percussion (credit LiveWellPhoto); Michael Tilson Thomas (credit Kristen Loken)

In the coming concert season, one of Boston's foundational presenters of classical music brings audiences an incredible variety of artists, small ensembles, and orchestras from around the world.

Now entering its 80th season, the Celebrity Series sets the tone for much of the cultural life of Boston through performances that range from dance to jazz and the spoken word. But at its core, it's an organization that adds to the rich classical music environment of the city. I talked about how that environment will look during the 2018-2019 season with the President and Executive Director of the Celebrity Series, Gary Dunning.

Gary has been at the Celebrity Series since 2011, and with his finger constantly on the pulse of what audiences in Boston want, we talked about what changes he's seen over the last few seasons:

We also talked about the two orchestras who will visit Boston as part of the Celebrity Series, the San Francisco Symphony, with conductor Michael Tilson Thomas (Mar. 24, 2019), and the Australian Chamber Orchestra, with pianist Paul Lewis (Apr. 13, 2019):

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Then we looked at a few of the concerts in the coming season that reflect new ways of programming, including, among others, mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato's "Songplay" (Mar. 1, 2019), a century-skipping, dance-inspired program by pianist Inon Barnatan (Nov. 18, 2018), an ensemble of players from the Vienna and Berlin Philharmonics called (wait for it) ... Philharmonix (May 3, 2019), and vocal ensemble Cantus (Apr. 3, 2019):

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New music is an indelible part of Boston's music scene, and Celebrity Series adds to that in the coming season through several concerts, including a So Percussion performance of Steve Reich's Drumming (Mar. 29, 2019) and music by Mason Bates performed by the Dover Quartet (Dec. 5, 2018):

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And Gary and I also talked about several other stellar artists and ensembles the Celebrity Series is bringing to Boston, including cellist Alisa Weilerstein, who performs all six Bach solo cello suites (Feb. 15, 2019), pianist Beatrice Rana (Feb. 27, 2019), a trio made up of violinist Joshua Bell, cellist Steven Isserlis, and pianist Jeremy Denk (Apr. 28, 2019), violinist Itzhak Perlman and pianist Evgeny Kissin (Apr. 22, 2019), and cellist Gautier Capuçon and pianist Yuja Wang (Apr. 6, 2019):

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This survey only scratches the surface, so for complete information about their 2018-2019 season, visit the Celebrity Series of Boston.

Brian McCreath is the Director of Production for CRB.