2026: A year for listening to new things

The mutual respect and admiration between composer Sergei Prokofiev and film director Sergei Eisenstein led to their collaboration, with Prokofiev composing deeply moving music for Eisenstein’s masterpiece Alexander Nevsky (1938), a film about the 13th-century prince of Novgorod who defeated an enemy army during the 'Battle on the Ice' in 1242.

Prokofiev was so pleased with his music that he transformed the film score into a symphonic cantata — and Riccardo Chailly has always cherished a wish to perform this cantata with our orchestra. On this occasion we will be joined by the Netherlands Radio Choir, the Chorus of the Dutch National Opera and the celebrated mezzo-soprano Ekaterina Semenchuk. Prokofiev’s music has an almost tangible expressiveness and transforms the historical battle into a universal story of humanity and its resilience. Prokofiev's rarely heard Fourth Symphony completes the programme.

Honorary guest conductor Iván Fischer here presents a truly unusual programme that begins with Leonard Bernstein's effervescent dances from On the Town; these put us into the right mood for composer / violinist Guy Braunstein’s Abbey Road Concerto, in which familiar melodies from the iconic Beatles album are woven into a virtuoso violin concerto.

Iván Fischer then takes us on a musical journey through the Czech Republic: excerpts from Smetana's Má vlast (My Fatherland) alternate with several of Dvořák’s Moravian duets sung by Mirella Hagen and Olivia Vermeulen. We experience Bohemian landscapes, moments from the lives of Moravian farmers’ sons and daughters, and a legendary battle; a different world passes before us before concluding with Smetana's immortal tale of a mighty river: The Moldau.

Relax and let these familiar melodies by Bernstein, The Beatles and Bohemian masters carry you away on an unforgettable journey.

The young French conductor Raphaël Pichon is a rising star in the world of Baroque music. Works by the French Baroque master Jean-Philippe Rameau take centre stage in The Domain of the Gods, a triptych that Pichon has compiled especially for this occasion, but you will also hear music by Gluck and Rebel.

The first part begins with sounds that startle the listener even today: the sounds with which Jean-Féry Rebel depicted the chaos before the universe was created. Our only escape from this underworld is to follow Orpheus, whom Gluck portrayed so realistically in his opera Orfeo ed Eurydice. A fascinating musical journey follows, at the end of which we reach Olympus, where we hear the most divine dance music that Rameau could conceive. Come and let yourself be transported to the Domain of the Gods by a conductor whose clear and individual vision will show you how early music can appear in a new light.

Antony Hermus leads a programme that showcases the rich heritage of black American composers. Our own solo trumpet Miro Petkov shines In Wynton Marsalis’ spectacular Trumpet Concerto, in which we hear a trumpeting elephant, references to French Baroque, blues, Louis Armstrong, the European-Jewish trumpet tradition and much more. Bass-baritone Davóne Tines performs Ol' Man River from the musical Show Boat and a spiritual in a new arrangement by Thomas Beijer. Also on the programme is a work by the young composer Brian Raphael Nabors, who is still relatively unknown here.

The programme ends with William Dawson's Negro Folk Symphony: this work caused a sensation when it was first performed in 1934, but then disappeared for a long time. Just listen how modern this deeply felt music still sounds today!