InTune

With the 2023-24 BSO season upon us, we are proud to explore themes of cultural heritage, resistance to oppression, and political freedom. We’re honoring the importance of the past while clearly declaring our beliefs and intentions for the future. The upcoming season will highlight profound historical and contemporary events through works inspired by recent global political protests and by the meaning of American freedom.

Dmitri Shostakovich, a Soviet-era Russian composer, is remembered as an independent, forward-thinking artist who struggled with the oppressive Soviet state. Culminating a decade-long immersion in Shostakovich’s musical world, Yo-Yo Ma performs Shostakovich’s cello concertos with Andris Nelsons and the BSO in October and then in January, Nelsons and the BSO give concert performances of the composer’s opera Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk. These works are being recorded for future release by Deutsche Grammophon as part of the BSO’s ongoing Shostakovich series. The final installment of the Grammy Award-winning recordings of the composer’s symphonies, featuring nos. 2, 3, 12, and 13, will be released October 20, 2023.

Early fall programs conducted by Andris Nelsons conclude with a three-concert series in which British pianist Paul Lewis, acclaimed as one of the world’s great Beethoven interpreters, plays all five Beethoven piano concertos. Beethoven’s commitment to humanism and personal freedom are reflected in the program’s other orchestral works: Hannah Kendall’s The Spark Catchers, inspired by Lemn Sissay’s poem about the women who labored at the Bryant and May match factory in 19th century East London, and James Lee III’s Freedom’s Genuine Dawn, a BSO co-commission that sets text by Frederick Douglass, narrated by Thomas Warfield.

The BSO’s longstanding commitment to performing new works is closely tied this year to our 2024 celebrations of legendary BSO Music Director Serge Koussevitzky’s 150th birth year and the 100th anniversary of the start of his BSO tenure. Along with three “Koussevitzky150 commissions” of works by Sofia Gubaidulina, Elena Langer, and Roberto Sierra next spring 2024, the orchestra performs commissioned works by Detlev Glanert, Iman Habibi, James Lee III, and Carlos Simon. In November 2023, Thomas Adès leads the BSO and pianist Kirill Gerstein for György Ligeti’s Piano Concerto to celebrate Ligeti’s centennial, in concerts that also include Adès’s own Tevot. A special program celebrating jazz great Wayne Shorter features bassist Esperanza Spalding and some of Shorter’s closest collaborators.

We believe that music challenges us all in different ways and presents opportunities to evolve. We invite everyone to open their minds, hearts, and ears with the BSO this season.