Gardner Museum Continues Weekend Concert Series Through May - Announces Two Programming Changes
L-R: Paul O’Dette courtesy of the artist, the Butter Quartet by Łukasz Rajchert.
Press photos available here.
The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum’s
Winter/Spring 2026 Weekend Concert Series Continues Through May
Announcing Two Programming Changes:
Paul O’Dette replaces Hopkinson Smith on March 8, 2026
The Butter Quartet replaces Diderot String Quartet on April 26, 2026
Information & Tickets: gardnermuseum.org/about/music
BOSTON, MA – The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum announces two programming changes during its Winter/Spring 2026 Weekend Concert Series, a fifteen-concert season curated by Abrams Curator of Music George Steel running from through May 17, 2026. On March 8, 2026, GRAMMY-winning lutenist Paul O’Dette will perform instead of Hopkinson Smith. On April 26, 2026, the celebrated period-instrument Butter Quartet will perform instead of the Diderot String Quartet. Ticket holders have been contacted and all previously purchased tickets will be honored.
Paul O’Dette’s concert program will celebrate the great Elizabethan composer and lutenist John Dowland, marking the 400th anniversary of Dowland’s death. O’Dette, who took home his second GRAMMY Award this year, will perform dances and laments of exquisite Tudor melancholy, celebrating the life and intimate music of this master musician. The Butter Quartet, formed during the members’ studies at the Royal Conservatory of The Hague, presents a concert exploring the origins of the Classical period. The four composers on the program—Haydn, Mozart, Vaňhal, and Dittersdorf—are reported to have performed together as a string quartet at private gatherings.
Other upcoming performances include the celebrated Claremont Trio returning with Louise Farrenc's Piano Quintet No. 1 alongside music by Ravel and Shulamit Ran (February 8); the impossibly talented Attacca Quartet performing a Museum-commissioned Boston premiere by David Lang paired with works by Mendelssohn and Bartók (February 22); Ensemble Signal performing Steve Reich’s monumental work Music for 18 Musicians as part of the Gardner Museum’s new Thursday Night Music series (February 26); Boston piano star Gloria Chien joining the young German stars of the Goldmund Quartet for Amy Beach's Piano Quintet alongside music by Haydn and Grażyna Bacewicz (March 1); Boston's beloved Borromeo String Quartet in Schubert's "Death and the Maiden" and works by Vijay Iyer, Caroline Shaw, and Jessie Montgomery (March 15); longtime Gardner Museum collaborators Castle of Our Skins presenting a portrait concert of violinist-composer Daniel Bernard Roumain (March 29); superstar guitarist Paul Galbraith performing on his remarkable eight-string “Brahms Guitar” (April 5); the return of virtuoso violinist Randall Goosby in a program of music by Beethoven, Debussy, and Amy Beach (April 12); Boston Children's Chorus honoring the legacy of civil rights icon Melnea Cass (April 18); the remarkable Imani Winds in a varied program including music by Simon Shaheen, Stevie Wonder, Valerie Coleman, and Fazil Say (April 19); stellar pianist Isata Kanneh-Mason in a thoughtful program including Beethoven's "Moonlight" and "Waldstein" sonatas, Ravel's Gaspard de la nuit, and selections by Dobrinka Tabakova (May 10); and the Renaissance String Quartet (violinists Randall Goosby and Jeremiah Blacklow, violist Jameel Martin, and cellist Daniel Hass) with works by Florence Price, Brahms, and Daniel Hass (May 17).
George Steel’s music programming for the Museum continues founder and legendary arts patron Isabella Stewart Gardner’s vision of bringing together musicians and audiences for inspiring gatherings, and features world-class artists in the Museum’s extraordinary Calderwood Hall—a 300-seat “sonic cube” with three levels of balconies designed so that 80% of seats are front row, creating a uniquely intense and intentional listening experience. Dating to 1927, the Gardner’s Weekend Concert Series is the longest running museum music program in the country. Much like Isabella Stewart Gardner did in her time, Steel champions unknown repertoire and embraces new works, creates connections and builds community among musicians, and supports them by presenting them in new endeavors and collaborations. His programming also frequently draws on the history of the Gardner Museum, featuring instruments from the Museum’s collection and music by composers who were associated with its founder. In honoring Isabella Stewart Gardner’s musical legacy, Music at the Gardner remains strongly committed to broadening the repertoire of music presented to include previously overlooked and marginalized composers as well as performers of all backgrounds.
Winter/Spring 2026 Weekend Concert Series Overview - Upcoming Performances
The celebrated Claremont Trio returns to the Gardner Museum on February 8, joined by violist Rosemary Nelis and bassist Bradley Aikman, for a performance of 19th-century French composer Louise Farrenc’s Piano Quintet No. 1 in A minor, Op. 30. Farrenc, whose music is only now receiving the attention it deserves, was a formidable pianist and composer whose piano quintet stands alongside the finest chamber works of her era. The trio will also take on Ravel’s luscious piano trio and Shulamit Ran’s yearning Soliloquy, which grew out of her work on an operatic adaptation of The Dybbuk by S. An-sky.
The impossibly talented Attacca Quartet returns to Calderwood Hall on February 22, bringing Bartók’s pungent fourth quartet, which mixes Hungarian folk music and modernism with foot-stomping ferocity. Mendelssohn’s Apollonian musicianship will be on display in his elegant String Quartet in E minor. The program is balanced by the Boston premiere of a Museum-commissioned work by David Lang, daisy, from the composer who created his “in-ear opera” true pearl for the Gardner Museum’s Tapestry Room in 2018. Lang’s music continues to surprise and delight with its inventive approaches to texture and form.
The inaugural Thursday Night Music concert on February 26 features Steve Reich’s Music for 18 Musicians performed by Ensemble Signal led by Co-Artistic Director Brad Lubman. Reich, a music pioneer and living legend, celebrates his 90th birthday in 2026. He has been called “the most original musical thinker of our time” (The New Yorker) and “among the great composers of the century” (The New York Times). Massively ambitious, the hour-long Music for 18 Musicians features four grand pianos, three full-size marimbas, two xylophones, four singers, clarinet, violin, and cello. In this work, Reich drew influences from a wide variety of sources including Balinese gamelan, plainchant, and jazz. It premiered 50 years ago in 1976 and continues to loom large in today’s musical landscape.
Boston piano star Gloria Chien returns to the Gardner Museum on March 1 to join the young German stars of the Goldmund Quartet in composer Amy Beach’s Piano Quintet, one of the finest works by the greatest of Boston’s “Second New England School” of composers. The Goldmunds will offer Haydn’s String Quartet in E-flat major, nicknamed his “Joke” quartet, from his astonishing Opus 33 set of quartets, along with the fourth quartet of Polish mid-century modernist Grażyna Bacewicz. Her music, only now finding a wider audience, balances Baltic intensity and Mendelssohnian wit.
The outstanding Paul O’Dette comes to Calderwood Hall, one of Boston’s best venues to hear the lute, on March 8. He will perform a recital in celebration of John Dowland, the great Elizabethan composer and lutenist who died 400 years ago. O’Dette will perform dances and laments of exquisite Tudor melancholy, celebrating the life and intimate music of this master musician.
Boston’s beloved Borromeo String Quartet pays a visit to the Gardner Museum on March 15 with a program built around Schubert’s monumental “Death and the Maiden” quartet, one of his supreme late masterpieces and a paragon of the Romantic spirit. The Borromeos also bring a quartet by jazz pianist and composer Vijay Iyer, who is Harvard’s Franklin D. and Florence Rosenblatt Professor of the Arts and a MacArthur Fellow. Nicholas Kitchen has arranged a pair of preludes and fugues from Bach and Shostakovich, while Entr’acte by Museum-favorite Caroline Shaw and Jessie Montgomery’s Source Code round out this adventurous and eclectic program that showcases the quartet’s remarkable range.
The Gardner’s longtime collaborators, Castle of Our Skins, perform a portrait concert on March 29 of violinist, composer, and musical firebrand Daniel Bernard Roumain, joined by the composer himself on electric violin along with Val-Inc as sound chemist. This concert includes three string quartets from Roumain’s cycle of musical portraits of major Black figures: String Quartet No. 1, “X” (1993); String Quartet No. 2, “King” (2001); and String Quartet No. 4, “Angelou” (2004). Roumain’s music thrillingly mixes classical American music, jazz, and hip-hop, all transformed through his own unique voice. His quartets are powerful testimonies to the lives and legacies of Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Maya Angelou.
On April 5, the Gardner Museum presents superstar Paul Galbraith, one of the great guitarists of our time and a superb interpreter. With the music of J.S. Bach and Albéniz at the heart of his program, Galbraith will perform on his remarkable eight-string “Brahms Guitar,” which he holds like a cello. His instrument and his artistry are sui generis. There is simply no one else doing what Galbraith does. The program ranges from Dowland’s Elizabethan gems through J.S. Bach’s French Suites and Partitas, to a sonata by Haydn, Albéniz’s masterpieces Suite Española and España, Ravel’s Menuet sur le nom d’Haydn, and Lennox Berkeley’s Quatre pièces. There is no better place to hear Galbraith’s miraculous playing than in the superb acoustics of Calderwood Hall.
Virtuoso violinist Randall Goosby returns on April 12 with pianist Zhu Wang for an intimate recital of epic music. Two major sonatas bookend the program: Debussy’s elusive and gorgeous sonata is paired with Beethoven’s sunny F major essay in the form. The concert also includes Southland Sketches by Harry Burleigh, who was key in forging a quintessential American musical language, modifying the gorgeous modal inflections of spirituals with the chromatic ambiguities of Wagner’s harmony. Romance by Boston’s Amy Beach, the best of the Second New England School of composers, gorgeously drinks from a similar Wagnerian well. Dvořák’s Four Romantic Pieces provide a bridge between these worlds, showing how Romanticism and folk traditions can be seamlessly interwoven.
Boston Children’s Chorus honors the remarkable legacy of Melnea Cass, the “First Lady of Roxbury,” on April 18. A tireless advocate for justice, Cass championed women’s suffrage, Black employment, early childhood education, care for the elderly, and civil rights leadership as president of Boston’s NAACP. Her lifelong commitment to equity shaped generations in Boston and her influence continues to resonate today. Audiences are invited to celebrate the enduring impact of this powerful yet often unsung Boston icon through a program of music that reflects her spirit of activism, community, and hope.
The celebrated wind quintet Imani Winds returns to the Gardner Museum on April 19 with a typically wide-ranging program showcasing works by composer-performers. Including the great American ‘oud player Simon Shaheen, Turkish pianist Fazil Say, the nonpareil Stevie Wonder, and Imani’s own Valerie Coleman, this program demonstrates the quintet’s commitment to expanding the wind repertoire with music that crosses cultural and stylistic boundaries. From Wonder’s jubilant Overjoyed to Coleman’s evocative Red Clay & Mississippi Delta, from Finnish composer Kalevi Aho’s substantial Wind Quintet No. 1 to Paquito D’Rivera’s A Little Cuban Waltz, this wonderful program is full of color and invention.
The Butter Quartet, a period-instrument string quartet, presents a program exploring the origins of the Classical period string quartet on April 26. The four composers on this program—Haydn, Mozart, Vaňhal, and Dittersdorf—are reported to have performed together as a string quartet at private gatherings. At the core of this program is a musical tip-of-the-hat between two of them: Hadyn’s Opus 20 “Sun” quartets number among his greatest works—witty, erudite, profound. Dazzled by Haydn’s fusion of counterpoint and gallant gesture, Mozart dedicated his most learned set of quartets to Haydn.
The stellar pianist member of the great English Kanneh-Mason family of musicians, Isata Kanneh-Mason, takes a moment away from the concerto stage on May 10 to bring this thoughtfully constructed program to Calderwood Hall: two of Beethoven’s best-loved sonatas, the “Moonlight” and the “Waldstein;” Ravel’s astonishing three-movement tour-de-force Gaspard de la nuit, inspired by the dark poetry of Aloysius Bertrand; and pair of shorter works, Halo and Nocturne, by Bulgarian-British composer Dobrinka Tabakova.
The Gardner Museum is thrilled and fortunate to present the Renaissance String Quartet on May 17, for the closing performance of the Winter/Spring 2026 Weekend Concert Series. These four terrific musicians (violinists Randall Goosby and Jeremiah Blacklow, violist Jameel Martin, and cellist Daniel Hass) find time in their busy touring lives as soloists and chamber musicians to perform together as a quartet. Brahms’ String Quartet No. 2 in A minor anchors the program with its characteristic blend of passion and intellectual rigor. The concert also includes the great American composer Florence Price’s String Quartet No. 1 in G Major. Price had a special gift for quartet writing; the exquisite and eloquent slow movement of her first quartet shows her love of American song, especially Black spirituals. The program closes with String Quartet No. 1, “Love and Levity,” by Daniel Hass, the cellist in the Renaissance String Quartet. He describes the piece as “Beethovenian in its thematic and structural tautness, but even more so in its motion towards excess.”
Winter/Spring 2026 At-a-Glance Concert Schedule
January 25: Twelfth Night Ensemble
February 1: Romuald Grimbert-Barré, violin; Tommy Mesa, cello; Albert Cano Smit, piano
February 8: Claremont Trio
February 22: Attacca Quartet
February 26: Steve Reich’s Music for 18 Musicians performed by Ensemble Signal - Thursday Night Music
March 1: Goldmund Quartet with Gloria Chien, piano
March 8: Paul O’Dette, lute
March 15: Borromeo String Quartet
March 29: Castle of Our Skins with Daniel Bernard Roumain, electric violin and Val-Inc, sound chemist
April 5: Paul Galbraith, guitar
April 12: Randall Goosby, violin with Zhu Wang, piano
April 18: Boston Children’s Chorus: The Road She Paved
April 19: Imani Winds
April 26: The Butter Quartet
May 10: Isata Kanneh-Mason, piano
May 17: Renaissance String Quartet
All concerts take place on Sundays at 1:30 pm, except for Ensemble Signal which performs on Thursday, February 26 at 7 pm and the Boston Children’s Chorus which performs on Saturday, April 18 at 2 pm. All concerts take place in Calderwood Hall at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (25 Evans Way, Boston, MA).
Ticketing Information
Tickets are available at gardnermuseum.org/about/music or by calling the Box Office at 617 278 5156. For additional information including about accessibility, please contact boxoffice@isgm.org.
About the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum invites you to escape the ordinary in a magical setting where art and community come together to inspire new ways of envisioning our world. Embodying the fearless legacy of its founder, the Museum offers a singular invitation to explore the past through a contemporary lens, creating meaningful encounters with art and joyful connections for all. Modeled after a Venetian palazzo, unforgettable galleries surround a luminous Courtyard and are home to masters such as Rembrandt, Raphael, Titian, Michelangelo, Whistler, and Sargent. The Renzo Piano Wing provides a platform for contemporary artists, musicians, and scholars and serves as an innovative venue where creativity is celebrated in all of its forms.
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum • 25 Evans Way, Boston, MA 02115 • Hours: Open Weekends from 10 am to 5 pm, Weekdays from 11am to 5 pm and Thursdays until 9 pm. Closed Tuesdays. • Admission: Adults $22; Seniors $20; Students $15; Free for members, children under 18, everyone on their birthday, and all named “Isabella” • $2 off admission with a same-day Museum of Fine Arts, Boston ticket • For information 617 566 1401 • Box Office 617 278 5156 • www.gardnermuseum.org
Music at the Gardner is supported by Manitou Fund. The Museum thanks its generous concert donors: The Coogan Concert in memory of Peter Weston Coogan; Fitzpatrick Family Concert; James Lawrence Memorial Concert; Alford P. Rudnick Memorial Concert; David Scudder in memory of his wife, Marie Louise Scudder; Wendy Shattuck Young Artist Concert; and Willona Sinclair Memorial Concert. The piano is dedicated as the Alex d’Arbeloff Steinway. The harpsichord was generously donated by Dr. Robert Barstow in memory of Marion Huse, and its care is endowed in memory of Dr. Barstow by The Barstow Fund. Music at the Gardner is also supported in part by Barbara and Amos Hostetter, Joseph Mari, Sallie and Jim McGregor, Nicie and Jay Panetta, The Aaron Copland Fund for Music, Inc., and the Massachusetts Cultural Council, which is supported by the state of Massachusetts and the National Endowment for the Arts.