Krannert Center Announces 2024–25 Season
Local hub of music, theatre, and dance, the Krannert Center for the Performing Arts has just announced its forthcoming 2024–25 season. We’ll take you through the classical music highlights to gear you up for another year of world-class artistry in central Illinois. With so much on offer, we're bringing you our Top 10 picks so you can make the most of this cultural gem of the prairie.
This season, Krannert Center brings you an exciting mix of international touring artists alongside emerging and student musicians. In her first year overseeing programming at Krannert Center, Assistant Director for Programming and Engagement Julienne Ehre said, “my guiding light was ‘joy.’ Our team focused on bringing our diverse community together through joyous events that highlight our common humanity”—something especially important during this time of increased political and ideological division.
Of course, Krannert Center offers more than just classical music; it presents a vibrant selection of music of all genres, plus theatre and dance. Given the scope of this blog, I will focus on the classical music offerings that will grace the Krannert Center stages.
Multiple internationally renowned orchestras will make their way to Champaign-Urbana, including the London Philharmonic Orchestra on October 15, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra on November 7, and the Czech National Philharmonic Orchestra of Moravia on February 16. These concerts will feature alongside the regular seasons of Krannert’s flagship ensembles. The Champaign-Urbana Symphony Orchestra celebrates its 65th season with Dvořák’s Te Deum, Baroque highlights, the annual holiday concert, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5, and Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring. Sinfonia da Camera’s season will feature Gershwin’s Rhapsody in Blue, Brahms’ Piano Concerto No. 2, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 4, romantic masterworks for Valentine’s Day, and Mozart’s soul-stirring Requiem. The Jupiter Quartet will continue as a Krannert Center artist-in-residence, with four exciting concerts across the season.
Big-name solo artists will also delight audiences with intimate recitals, including Canadian pianist Jaeden Izik-Dzurko on November 10, four-time GRAMMY award-winning violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter on April 1, and Kennedy Center honoree soprano Renée Fleming on January 25. Plus, don’t miss the panel discussion the day before Fleming’s recital, where she will talk about her latest book, Music and Mind: Harnessing the Arts for Health and Wellness (read my book review here).
Editor Top 10
September 13 – Tonality Chamber Choir: America Will Be
The Tonality Chamber Choir presents America Will Be, a renewed vision for an inclusive America. The repertoire conjures a patriotic future for the United States for all of us. The Chamber Choir employs a “choral spectrum,” traditional choral sounds also presented with contemporary styles reflect the diversity of voices and the inspiring storytelling Tonality weaves so well. As an ideal America embraces the full diversity of humanity, America Will Be asks questions about the justice system, immigration, climate change, Black Lives Matter, mental health, LGBTQ+ equity while honoring the promise of a great America.
October 12 – Champaign-Urbana Symphony Orchestra: Music and Majesty
CUSO’s 65th season begins with a concert of majestic music to stir the soul. The dramatic sweep of the Hiawatha Overture shows why Samuel Coleridge-Taylor is considered one of the finest composers of the late 19th century. Mendelssohn’s Symphony No. 5 offers rich orchestral colors and a rousing finale based on the hymn “A Mighty Fortress.” The University of Illinois Oratorio Society and Chamber Singers join CUSO in Dvořák’s uplifting Te Deum, one of his most joyous and celebratory works for soloists, chorus, and orchestra.
November 7 – Chicago Symphony Orchestra
One of the world’s preeminent conductors and the CSO’s distinguished 10th music director from 2010 until 2023, Riccardo Muti returns with a program reminiscent of the conductor’s native Italy with a boisterous overture by Donizetti and sumptuous ballet music by Verdi. Golijov’s Megalopolis Suite, a CSO commission and world premiere, features music from his score to Francis Ford Coppola’s epic 2024 film in which the fate of Ancient Rome haunts a modern world.
January 25 – Renée Fleming: Voice of Nature – The Anthropocene Recital
Renée Fleming highlights the fragility of the natural world in this recital program, presented as an uninterrupted set along with projected video from National Geographic. “The music . . . begins in a time almost two centuries ago, when people had a profound connection to the beauty of nature,” Fleming says. “Now we have reached a moment when we see all too clearly the effects of our own activity.” Through Romantic era art songs by Grieg, Liszt, Fauré, and Hahn, and new commissions from Nico Muhly, Caroline Shaw, and Kevin Puts, this program explores nature as both inspiration and casualty of humanity.
February 21/22 – Mark Morris Dance Group and Music Ensemble
Exploring and responding to music, seeking the composer’s inspiration through his infinitely fertile movement language is Mark Morris’s stock in trade. This performance opens with two light-hearted works to solo piano accompaniment: Candleflowerdance, set to Stravinsky’s Serenade in A and Excursions, set to Barber’s Excursions for Piano. The program also features Via Dolorosa, set to Nico Muhly’s meditative composition The Street for solo harp, inspired by the poetic texts of Alice Goodman.
February 27 – Excerpts from Terence Blanchard’s Fire Shut Up in My Bones
Terence Blanchard’s GRAMMY-winning masterpiece Fire Shut Up in My Bones offers a hybrid classical/jazz/R&B/gospel-inflected score to tell the story of a young man’s journey to overcome and transcend a life of trauma and hardship. Blanchard’s E-Collective ensemble, Turtle Island Quartet, and singers Nicholas Newton and Adrienne Danrich perform selections from the opera against a backdrop of video projections by Andrew F. Scott.
March 29 – Sinfonia da Camera: Mozart Requiem
Sinfonia da Camera closes out its season with the help of the University of Illinois Chamber Singers and Oratorio Society. The first half features Beethoven’s Coriolan Overture followed by Beethoven’s Fantasy for piano, vocal soloists, mixed chorus, and orchestra, Op. 80. The program concludes with Mozart’s Requiem Mass, an iconic masterwork as overwhelmingly powerful as it is introspectively poignant.
April 1 – Anne-Sophie Mutter, violin, with Lambert Orkis, piano
For 48 years, Anne-Sophie Mutter has made her mark on the international classical music scene as a soloist, mentor, and visionary. With Lambert Orkis, her collaborative pianist of 36 years, Mutter presents sonatas by Mozart and Respighi, Clara Schumann’s Three Romances, and Schubert’s Fantasy in C Major, a work Mutter believes to be the greatest piece ever written for violin and piano.
April 9 – An Evening with Mandy Patinkin and Nathan Gunn
Broadway legend Mandy Patinkin and opera star Nathan Gunn join forces in this unique showcase. Accompanied by Julie Jordan Gunn and Adam Ben-David, the duo will perform over two dozen songs, including solos and duets, some from Mandy’s world of Broadway, some showcasing Nathan’s operatic brilliance, as well as folk and pop favorites.
April 26 – Jessie Montgomery + Third Coast Percussion
Composer/performer Jessie Montgomery and Chicago-based percussion ensemble Third Coast Percussion exhibit their excellence as visionary creators and virtuosic performers. This program showcases Montgomery’s first-ever work for percussion quartet paired with Lou Harrison’s Concerto for Violin with Percussion Orchestra, a tour de force that draws inspiration from the vibrant sounds of Javanese gamelan. Read my review of this program here, performed in Chicago last month.
So, mark you calendars, and keep an eye out for updates on when tickets will go on sale. In the meantime, check out Krannert Center's full season announcement here.
