Celebrate Chicago’s vibrant classical music scene.
Music in Chicago gives you a front-row seat to some of the best classical music concerts presented throughout the Chicago area. Every day in the noon hour, Lisa Flynn features recent performances from the city’s soloists, orchestras, choirs, bands and chamber ensembles. The Elgin Symphony Orchestra, St. Charles Singers, Rachel Barton Pine, Civic Orchestra, Midwest Mozart Festival, and Chicago Latino Music Festival are among the many artists and organizations that have been heard on this weekday program.
WFMT is always looking for new groups and musicians to feature on Music in Chicago. If you or your ensemble would like to be considered for our program, audition online to let us know more about you and to send us a recording.
May 6 – May 10, 2024
May 10, 2024, 12:00 pm
The artists you'll enjoy hearing this week are pianist Winston Choi, composer Shawn E. Okpebholo, Lakeshore Rush, Newberry Consort, and a live performance by cellist Olivia Jakyoung Huh and pianist Victor Asunción.
Thirsty Ears Festival 2018
October 19, 2018
In August 2018, Access Contemporary Music presented the third annual Thirsty Ears Festival, Chicago’s only classical music street festival. It featured two days of stellar soloists and ensembles, alongside craft beer, food trucks, vendor booths and kid-friendly activities. Pianist Ariella Mak-Neiman presented a program including music of Bach, Debussy, and Brahms. Members of the Chicago-based Ursa Ensemble played Schubert’s Violin Sonatina ...
Pacifica Quartet Plays Mendelssohn at Ravinia
October 12, 2018
Recognized for its virtuosity, exuberant performance style, and often-daring repertory choices, over the past two decades the Pacifica Quartet has achieved international recognition as one of the finest chamber ensembles performing today. The members of the quartet live in Bloomington, Indiana, where they serve as quartet-in-residence and full-time faculty members at Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music. This past summer, the ...
Violinist Pinchas Zukerman and Pianist Angela Cheng at Ravinia
October 5, 2018
With a celebrated career encompassing five decades, Pinchas Zukerman reigns as one of today’s most sought after and versatile musicians – violin and viola soloist, conductor, and chamber musician. He is renowned as a virtuoso, admired for the expressive lyricism of his playing, singular beauty of tone, and impeccable musicianship, which can be heard throughout his discography of over 100 ...
Chicago Chamber Choir
October 5, 2018
Founded in 1996, the Chicago Chamber Choir is passionately committed to creating a moving experience for audiences by performing exceptional choral music that celebrates the unlimited power of the human voice. The choir’s 40 singers come from a variety of backgrounds. Some are professional musicians, others are teachers, and still others have careers in fields as diverse as law and medicine. They are ...
Jorge Federico Osorio at Ravinia Festival
September 28, 2018
Pianist Jorge Federico Osorio has been lauded throughout the world for his superb musicianship, powerful technique, vibrant imagination, and deep passion. Highly revered in his native Mexico, Osorio resides in the Chicago area, where he serves on the faculty at Roosevelt University’s Chicago College of Performing Arts. He performed a wide-ranging recital on July 26, 2018, at Ravinia’s Martin Theater. Osorio’s ...
Miriam Fried & Friends at Ravinia Festival
September 21, 2018
Violinist Miriam Fried and friends took the stage at Ravinia’s Martin Theatre to perform a program of chamber works by Mozart and Schubert. The program from June 28, 2018, marked the 30th anniversary of Ravinia’s Steans Music Institute, the conservatory at America’s oldest summer music festival. Each season, talented young musicians from around the world come together at RSMI to make music ...
Rembrandt Chamber Musicians Play Milhaud
September 21, 2018
Founded in the fall of 1990, the Rembrandt Chamber Musicians features six of the most highly accomplished musicians in the Chicago area, including principal members of the Lyric Opera of Chicago orchestra. The ensemble’s expansive repertoire, ranging from historically informed performances of Baroque classics to contemporary works by local composers, has consistently garnered high praise and recognition. Hear the Rembrandt Chamber ...
Chopin in Paris at the North Shore Chamber Music Festival
September 14, 2018
Opening night of the 2018 North Shore Chamber Music Festival at Northbrook’s Village Presbyterian Church was titled “Chopin in Paris.” The concert on June 13 featured a chamber version of Chopin’s First Piano Concerto. The performers were William Wolfram, piano; Vadim Gluzman and Lisa Shihoten, violins; Masumi Per Rostad, viola; Ani Aznavoorian, cello.
Baroque Splendors with the Pilgrim Chamber Players
September 7, 2018
During the 2017/18 season, the Pilgrim Chamber Players presented a concert of mostly Baroque music for the first time. Harpsichordist Jory Vinikour was joined by musicians who are Baroque specialists performing Bach’s great Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 and a Trio Sonata. Vinikour presented a mini recital of harpsichord solos by the French composer Jean Philippe Rameau. The program also included a rarely heard ...
Violinist Paul Huang Plays Dvořák
September 7, 2018
Violinist Paul Huang made his Grant Park Music Festival debut this summer, playing Barber’s Violin Concerto. While in Chicago, the recipient of the prestigious 2015 Avery Fisher Career Grant and the 2017 Lincoln Center Award for Emerging Artists returned to WFMT’s Fay and Daniel Levin Performance Studio to play on the Impromptu series. Huang was joined by Chicago pianist Marta Aznavoorian.
Pianist Vladimir Feltsman Plays Schumann and Chopin
September 7, 2018
Pianist and conductor Vladimir Feltsman is one of the most versatile and constantly interesting musicians of our time. His vast repertoire encompasses music from the Baroque to 21st-century composers. He has appeared with all the major American orchestras and on the most prestigious musical stages and festivals worldwide. On June 8, 2018, Feltsman played at the Ravinia Festival’s Martin Theater with a ...
Rush Hour Concert Series Season Finale
August 31, 2018
This year’s Rush Hour Concert Series at St. James Cathedral wrapped up with the music of Leonard Bernstein, joining the worldwide celebration of his centennial in 2018. The program on August 28 opened with the Sonata, Op. 1, originally written for clarinet and adapted for viola by Raphael Hillyer, a friend and recital partner of Bernstein. Then, the Cathedral Choir and ...
Juilliard String Quartet at Ravinia Festival
August 31, 2018
With unparalleled artistry and enduring vigor, the Juilliard String Quartet continues to inspire audiences around the world. Founded in 1946, and widely known as “the quintessential American string quartet,” the Juilliard draws on a deep and vital engagement to the classics, while embracing the mission of championing new works, a vibrant combination of the familiar and the daring. The quartet visited the Ravinia ...
KAIA String Quartet Plays Bragato and Piazzolla
August 24, 2018
This week at St. James Cathedral’s Rush Hour Concert Series, the KAIA String Quartet performed a concert titled “Cuarteto” featuring music of José Bragato and Astor Piazzolla. KAIA is a Chicago-based ensemble devoted to capturing the essence of Latin American culture through the medium of the string quartet. It was the first ensemble-in-residence with WFMT where they performed, curated, and exposed audiences to new ...
A Night at Bach’s Coffeehouse with Apollo’s Fire
August 24, 2018
Acclaimed as “one of the pre-eminent period-instrument ensembles” (The Independent, London), Apollo’s Fire is named for the classical god of music and the sun. Founded by Jeannette Sorrell to revive the Baroque ideal that music should evoke the various Affekts or passions in the listeners, Apollo’s Fire is a collection of creative artists who share Sorrell’s passion for drama and rhetoric. The ensemble presented a program titled ...
Avalon String Quartet Plays Schubert
August 17, 2018
The Rush Hour Concert Series is presented every Tuesday evening during the summertime in downtown Chicago’s St. James Cathedral. The free series offers short, high-quality chamber music performances in an intimate and informal setting. This concert from August 14, 2018, was dedicated to the late founder and artistic director of the Rush Hour Concert Series, Deborah Sobol. The Avalon String Quartet and ...
North Shore Chamber Music Festival 2018
August 10, 2018
This week, we have more music from the 2018 North Shore Chamber Music Festival, located at the Village Presbyterian Church in Northbrook, Illinois. The NSCMF was founded in 2010 by violinist Vadim Gluzman and pianist Angela Yoffe in a quest to provide Chicago’s North Shore with musical experiences of the same caliber and quality as those found in Metropolitan Chicago and the ...
Civic Orchestra of Chicago Performs Holst’s The Planets
August 10, 2018
In this concert from June 4, 2018, Francesco Lecce-Chong leads the Civic Orchestra of Chicago in “Jupiter” from Gustav Holst’s orchestral suite “The Planets.” American conductor Francesco Lecce-Chong has garnered acclaim for his dynamic performances, commitment to innovative programming, and profound engagement in community outreach. In the 2017-2018 season, he was appointed music director of the Eugene Symphony. In the same season, ...
CSO Young Artists Competition Winner Yerin Yang Plays Grieg
August 3, 2018
Many musicians dream to perform on the stage of Orchestra Hall with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. The Crain-Maling Foundation Chicago Symphony Orchestra Young Artists Competition makes this dream come true for one young musician every year. On Saturday, March 3, four young pianists competed for the opportunity to perform with the CSO during a student concert in the 2018/19 season. For ...
Vivaldi with Third Coast Baroque
July 27, 2018
Third Coast Baroque is a versatile ensemble comprised of “Chicago’s most accomplished period instrumentalists and singers” (Chicago Tribune) under the artistic direction of conductor Rubén Dubrovsky. The ensemble seeks to take Baroque music to the people of Chicago and beyond by removing barriers of location and setting, focusing on accessibility, educating audiences about the diverse influences that underlie the Baroque ...