CSO announces part of 2021-22 season — and Muti’s return to Chicago
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The Chicago Symphony Orchestra Association announced part of the orchestra’s upcoming 2021-22 season in Orchestra Hall at Symphony Center on Wednesday, as well as the news that Riccardo Muti would be returning to Chicago for a three-week residency early in the fall.
Muti’s residency (Sept. 23 to Oct. 9) will launch his 12th season as music director of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra (CSO). His opening programs with the orchestra represent their first performances together in Orchestra Hall since Feb. 2020.
“I am delighted to rejoin my Chicago Symphony Orchestra family once again to share the sound of this great Orchestra with audiences in Chicago,” Muti said in the announcement. “As it has for many years, the spiritual food of culture will bring us together, but this time with a special poignancy after being so long apart.”
Full CSO programming for fall 2021 is coming July 13. Create Your Own series ticket packages of three or more programs, including the opening programs of the 2021-22 season, go on sale to the public beginning 10 a.m. July 13, with single tickets going on sale later this summer. More information at cso.org.
Saint-Georges, Price and Beethoven (Sept. 23-25): The opening program, conducted by Muti, includes the CSO’s first performances of the Overture to the 18th-century comic opera “L’Amant anonyme (The Anonymous Lover)” by Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges, who was born in Guadeloupe to a French father and Senagalese mother. Also the orchestra’s first performance of the Andante moderato written by Black American composer Florence Price, and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 3.
Kavakos and Beethoven (Sept. 30 to Oct. 2): Muti and the CSO are joined by violinist Leonidas Kavakos for Brahms Violin Concerto in D Major, plus Beethoven’s Symphony No. 7.
Mazzoli and Tchaikovsky Pathétique (October 7-9): Muti’s final program in the fall 2021 residency opens with the CSO’s first performances of current composer-in-residence Missy Mazzoli’s 2006 orchestral work “These Worlds in Us,” inspired by her father’s military service and a poem honoring a military pilot’s life. Plus works by 19th century Russian composers Anatoly Liadov and Pyotr Tchaikovsky.
Previewed for 2022: A world premiere performance of the CSO-commissioned work “Orpheus Undone” by Mazzoli; a world premiere of a commissioned work by incoming composer-in-residence Jessie Montgomery; the CSO’s first performances of Florence Price’s Symphony No. 3 and of Philip Glass’ Symphony No. 11. Season finale programs including Verdi’s “Un ballo in maschera,” performed in concert, and a free Concert for Chicago in Millennium Park in June 2022.
