
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.
February 10 – February 14, 2024
February 14, 2025, 12:00 pm
Listen this week to performances by violinist Martin Davids, tuba soloist Gene Pokorny, pianist Jet Stephen Chong, the Black Oak Ensemble, and EStrella Piano Duo.
Axiom Brass at St. James Cathedral
July 20, 2018
Praised for their “high level of musicality and technical ability” and for their “clean, clear and precise sound,” the award-winning Axiom Brass Quintet has quickly established itself as “one of the major art music groups in brass chamber music.” The ensemble performed at the Rush Hour Concert Series on July 17, 2018, at St. James Cathedral in downtown Chicago. The program “Limitless” journeyed through time and space, visually ...
Bach Week Festival 2018
July 6, 2018
A rite of spring in the Chicago area, Bach Week Festival was founded in 1974 by Karel Paukert, then associate professor of Organ and Church Music at Northwestern University and Organist/Choirmaster at St. Luke’s Episcopal Church. Mr. Paukert combined St. Luke’s renowned choirs with professional instrumentalists from the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Lyric Opera Orchestra and Northwestern with a mission in mind – to ...
“Americana” with Fifth House Ensemble
July 6, 2018
This Rush Hour Concert from July 3, 2018, at St. James Cathedral was an all-American program with members of the Fifth House Ensemble – Charlene Kluegel, violin; Herine Coetzee Koschak, cello; and Katherine Petersen, piano. They played Amy Beach’s Piano Trio and Paul Schoenfeld’s Café Music. Fifth House Ensemble taps the collaborative spirit of chamber music to create engaging performances and interactive educational programs, forging meaningful partnerships with ...
Illinois Philharmonic Orchestra Performs Respighi
June 29, 2018
The Illinois Philharmonic Orchestra is the largest performing arts organization in Chicago’s southern suburbs, providing professional orchestral music of beauty and excellence to the region. The IPO’s repertoire ranges from Baroque and Classical masterpieces, to world premieres and modern favorites. The concert on October 14 at Trinity Christian College’s Ozinga Chapel not only opened the orchestra’s main series for the 2017-18 season, ...
Northwestern University Symphony Orchestra & Combined Choirs: Twilight of an Empire
June 22, 2018
Combined ensembles from Northwestern University presented this program on May 26 & 27 in Pick-Staiger Concert Hall. “Twilight of an Empire” featured two distinctly different Russian composers whose music exemplified the end of the Romantic era and the dawn of the next. Rachmaninoff’s The Bells was inspired by Edgar Allan Poe’s poem of the same name. Prokofiev’s Symphony No. 2 in D ...
Arensky String Quartet at St. James Cathedral
June 15, 2018
This week we head downtown to Chicago’s Gold Coast neighborhood and take a seat at St. James Cathedral for another performance at the Rush Hour Concert Series. These 30-minute concerts offer unparalleled access to repertoire spanning 700 years, performed by world-class musicians from Chicago’s leading ensembles including the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Lyric Opera of Chicago, and independent chamber music groups. John Macfarlane, ...
Elgin Symphony Orchestra Performs Bernstein’s Suite from Candide
May 8, 2018
The Elgin Symphony Orchestra concluded its 67th season with a program of Bernstein and Mahler. The performance of a suite from Candide was part of a worldwide celebration of the 100th anniversary of the birth of the great American composer Leonard Bernstein. The suite includes selections from the operetta, arranged by the composer’s long-time personal assistant Charlie Harmon. Music Director Andrew Grams ...
St. Cecilia Choir of St. John Cantius
March 10, 2018
Throughout the year, St. John Cantius Church in Chicago offers music events as well as sacred music for the church’s various masses and devotions. Sunday masses regularly feature Gregorian chant and musical offerings from several choirs, ranging from the Renaissance period and the Viennese choral tradition to modern choral works that are consonant with the Roman tradition of sacred music. ...
Chicago Piano Duo Festival Winter Minifest
March 2, 2018
The Chicago Duo Piano Festival was founded in 1988 by Music Institute of Chicago faculty members Claire Aebersold and Ralph Neiweem. Its mission is to foster a deeper interest in the repertoire, performance, and teaching of music for piano, four hands and two pianos, in a fun and supportive atmosphere. The Festival offers summer and winter events which include coachings, ...
Appalachian Concerto: Kruger Brothers and Kontras Quartet
January 9, 2018
The Kruger Brothers teamed up with the Kontras Quartet on January 9th, 2018, at the Athenaeum Theatre for an evening of collaborative classical and folk music. Composed in 2010, the Appalachian Concerto is a work for banjo, bass, guitar, and string quartet. It was composed in the form of a classical concerto, and was written to reflect the cultural history of ...
Flutist Demarre McGill Performs a “Rigoletto” Fantasy
November 17, 2017
Winner of the prestigious Avery Fisher Career Grant, flutist Demarre McGill is acclaimed for his “richly saturated tone, spirited technique and expressive warmth” and has quickly become one of the most sought-after flutists of his generation. He enjoys an active career as a leading soloist, recitalist, artistic director and chamber musician. McGill performs Wilhelm Popp’s Rigoletto Fantasy for Flute and Piano ...
Civitas Ensemble at Rush Hour Concert Series
August 15, 2017
Rush Hour Concerts at St. James Cathedral in Chicago were founded by Deborah Sobol in 2000. The series aims to reinvent the traditional classical music concert format by presenting short, high-quality chamber music performances in an intimate and informal setting. Each free 30-minute concert is performed by world-class musicians from Chicago ensembles including the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Lyric Opera of ...
Civic Orchestra of Chicago Performs Bartók
January 21, 2017
Founded in 1919, the Civic Orchestra of Chicago has trained thousands of the nation’s finest emerging professional musicians while presenting free concerts at Symphony Center and in schools and other neighborhood venues throughout the Chicago area. On January 21, 2017, the Civic Orchestra was led by Rossen Milanov in Bartók’s Concerto for Orchestra.