Wednesdays at 6:30 pm
The Grant Park Music Festival is back, and so are WFMT’s live broadcasts!
WFMT is bringing you the very best that the Grant Park Music Festival has to offer this summer, giving you a front-row ticket to the Chicago summertime institution. With live broadcasts featuring scintillating solo performances, rousing choral opuses, and beloved orchestral landmarks, WFMT is your ticket to a whole summer’s worth of great music.
There are no upcoming broadcasts at the moment.
Brahms Violin Concerto
June 21, 2019
Violinist Augustin Hadelich makes his Grant Park Music Festival debut with this performance of Brahms’ Piano Concerto. The program also features a Shostakovich symphony and the world premiere commission of a work by GPMF composer-in-residence Stacy Garrop.
Mozart Piano Concerto No. 23
June 19, 2019
Pianist Inon Barnatan joins conductor Carlos Kalmar and the Grant Park Orchestra in a performance of Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 23. The program also features works of Weber and Busoni.
Opening Night: Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 2
June 12, 2019
The Grant Park Music Festival’s season — and WFMT’s series of 10 live broadcasts from the festival — begins with this mixed program. Conductor Carlos Kalmar leads the Grant Park Orchestra in works of Ellen Taaffe Zwilich and Tchaikovsky, and violinist Benjamin Beilman performs Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 1.
Carmina Burana, Closing Night
August 17, 2018
Carlos Kalmar leads the Grant Park Orchestra and Chorus; Claire de Sevigne, soprano; Michael Maniaci, countertenor; John Brancy, baritone; members of the Anima – Glen Ellyn Children’s Chorus.
Chopin Piano Concerto No. 1
August 8, 2018
Carlos Kalmar conducts the Grant Park Orchestra and pianist George Li in a program of works by Vincent and Chopin.
Tchaikovsky “Romeo and Juliet”
August 1, 2018
Carlos Kalmar conducts the Grant Park Orchestra in an evening of opera highlights.
Liszt Piano Concerto No. 2
July 25, 2018
Guest conductor Gemma New leads the Grant Park Orchestra in a performance of Piano Concerto No. 2, by Liszt featuring pianist Kirill Gerstein.
Beethoven Symphony No. 2
July 18, 2018
Roderick Cox, guest conductor, leads the Grant Park Orchestra in a performance that features Jeremy Black, violin; Walter Haman, cello; Eric Hall, bassoon; and Nathan Mills, oboe.
Music of the Silver Screen
July 11, 2018
Guest conductor Vinay Parameswaran leads the Grant Park Orchestra in favorites from An American in Paris, Raiders of the Lost Ark, The Adventures of Robin Hood, Citizen Kane, Ben Hur and more
Independence Day Salute
July 4, 2018
Christopher Bell leads the Festival’s annual Independence Day tradition, featuring an evening of patriotic favorites, plus George Gershwin’s triumphant Rhapsody in Blue featuring pianist Emily Bear.
Schubert Symphony No. 3
June 27, 2018
Carlos Kalmar conducts the Grant Park Orchestra in a program featuring flutist Adam Walker.
Mozart Violin Concerto
June 15, 2018
Carlos Kalmar conducts the Grant Park orchestra and violin soloist William Hagen.
Opening Night – Haydn and Walton
June 13, 2018
Carlos Kalmar conducts the Grant Park Orchestra and Chorus in a program that features baritone soloist Dashon Burton from the Grammy Award-winning group Roomful of Teeth. Below, Michael San Gabino interviews Grant Park audience and artists before the opening night concert.
Grant Park Music Chorus Sings Rachmaninoff
April 9, 2018
The Grant Park Chorus last summer presented two performances of Rachmaninoff’s All-Night Vigil (Vespers), one of the alltime greatest works of a cappella choral music. It was a personal favorite of the composer’s among his creations, and has often been singled out as his masterpiece. Consisting of 15 movements, the work draws on sacred texts from the Vespers, the Matins, ...
Beethoven Symphony No. 9
August 18, 2017
Led by conductor Carlos Kalmar and chorus director Christopher Bell, the Grant Park Orchestra and Chorus come together for a performance of Brahms’s Schicksalslied and Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9. Featured performers include soprano Janai Brugger, mezzo-soprano Allyson McHardy, tenor Brendan Tuohy, and bass Russell Braun.
Haydn Cello Concerto
August 16, 2017
Cellist Harriet Krijgh joins the Grant Park Orchestra in a performance led by Carlos Kalmar at the Jay Pritzker Pavilion in Chicago’s Millennium Park. Listen to Resphigi’s The Birds, Chadwick’s Symphonic Sketches, and Haydn’s Cello Concerto in C Major, which features Krijgh.
Brahms Piano Concerto No. 1
July 26, 2017
Led by Carlos Kalmar, the Grant Park Orchestra and pianist Stephen Hough perform at the Jay Pritzker Pavilion in Chicago’s Millennium Park. Hear Kodály’s Dances of Galánta, Brahms’s Hungarian Dances Nos. 1, 3, and 6, and Brahms’s Piano Concerto No. 1, featuring Hough.
Saint-Saëns Violin Concerto
July 19, 2017
Guest conductor Brett Mitchell and violinist Angelo Xiang Yu join the Grant Park Orchestra in a performance at the Jay Pritzker Pavilion in Chicago’s Millennium Park. Listen to Bunch’s Supermaximum, Copland’s The Red Pony, and Saint-Saëns’s Violin Concerto No. 3, featuring Yu.
Haydn London Symphony
July 12, 2017
Guest conductor Fawzi Haimor leads the Grant Park Orchestra in a performance of Roustom’s Ramal, Haydn’s Symphony No. 104 “London,” and Hindemith’s Symphonic Metamorphosis live from the Jay Pritzker Pavilion in Chicago’s Millennium Park.
Independence Day Salute
July 4, 2017
Conductor Christopher Bell leads the Grant Park Orchestra in its annual Independence Day Salute, which brings patriotic favorites such as Sousa’s “The Stars and Stripes Forever,” Tchaikovsky’s 1812 Overture, and more to the Jay Pritzker Pavilion in Chicago’s Millennium Park. An encore performance will be held on Wednesday, July 5, at 6:30 pm at the South Shore Cultural Center, 7059 ...
