Fabio Luisi’s winter/spring 2026: Madama Butterfly in concert with DSO, plus Bruckner 9 and Mahler “Symphony of a Thousand”; Schoenberg and Wagner with DNSO; guest engagements at Zurich and Dutch National Operas; much more
(January 2026) — Grammy- and ECHO Klassik Award-winning conductor Fabio Luisi is now in his sixth season as Louise W. & Edmund J. Kahn Music Director of the Dallas Symphony Orchestra (DSO), as the orchestra celebrates its 125th anniversary. Highlights of his winter and spring performances with the DSO include Puccini’s Madama Butterfly as this season’s opera-in-concert production, with the cast including soprano Jennifer Rowley in the title role, along with tenor Evan LeRoy Johnson, mezzo-soprano Manuela Custer, and baritone Alessandro Luongo (Jan 9 & 11). Bruckner and Mahler are prominently featured this winter and spring, beginning with Bruckner’s Symphony No. 9 (Jan 15 & 16); continuing with Mahler’s Symphony No. 4 with soprano soloist Sofia Fomina on a three-stop tour in California, paired with Schumann’s Piano Concerto performed by Hélène Grimaud (March 31–April 2); and closing the season with Mahler’s Symphony No. 8 (“Symphony of a Thousand”), one of the largest-scale choral works in the symphonic repertoire (May 15 & 17). Luisi also serves as Principal Conductor of the Danish National Symphony Orchestra (DNSO), where he continues the celebration of the orchestra’s 100th anniversary with performances of Schoenberg’s Pelleas und Melisande, along with Wagner’s Wesendonck Songs featuring soprano Sara Jakubiak (April 24 & 25). As Chief Conductor of Tokyo’s NHK Symphony Orchestra, he leads two April programs pairing Classical and Romantic giants: Haydn’s Cello Concerto featuring Jan Vogler is paired with Bruckner’s Ninth Symphony (April 11 & 12), and Mozart’s Clarinet Concerto featuring NHK Symphony Orchestra principal clarinetist Kenji Matsumoto is paired with Mahler’s Fifth Symphony (April 16 & 17).
As a guest conductor, Luisi helms productions of Paul Hindemith’s Cardillac at Zurich Opera (Feb 15–March 10) and Verdi’s Simon Boccanegra at Dutch National Opera (June 4–28), during the run of which he also conducts the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in two performances of Beethoven’s Eighth Symphony paired with works by Copland and Barber (June 11 & 12).
Dallas Symphony Orchestra
Luisi’s work in opera is extensive and celebrated, including six years as Principal Guest Conductor of the Metropolitan Opera, during which he won a Grammy Award for his leadership of the last two operas of the Ring cycle. Texas Classical Review, reflecting on the DSO’s 2024–25 concert Ring cycle performances, called the cycle “a truly remarkable event and one that one can hope bodes well for similar operatic undertakings in the future.” Following up on that formidable achievement, Luisi will conduct Puccini’s Madama Butterfly as this season’s opera-in-concert production, with the cast including American soprano Jennifer Rowley in the title role, along with tenor Evan LeRoy Johnson, mezzo-soprano Manuela Custer, and baritone Alessandro Luongo (Jan 9 & 11).
Also in January, Luisi and the orchestra follow up on their critically acclaimed performances of Anton Bruckner’s Fourth Symphony in 2022–23 and his Seventh in 2024–25 with his Symphony No. 9, continuing their long-term exploration of his symphonic output (Jan 15 & 16). Mahler’s symphonies have likewise figured prominently in Luisi’s programming with the DSO. Two seasons ago, they performed the Fifth Symphony, and last season’s finale was Mahler’s Symphony No. 2, “Resurrection.” After opening the current season with the Fourth Symphony, they take that work on tour to three cities in California, with Sofia Fomina reprising the soprano solo and the program completed by Schumann’s Piano Concerto with soloist Hélène Grimaud (March 31–April 2). They then close the season with Mahler’s monumental Symphony No. 8 (“Symphony of a Thousand”), one of the largest-scale choral works in the symphonic repertoire and offered by the composer as an optimistic expression of confidence in the eternal human spirit. Featured singers are soprano Rachel Willis-Sørensen, soprano Meghan Kasanders, soprano Deanna Breiwick, mezzo-soprano Olesya Petrova, mezzo-soprano Renée Tatum, tenor Limmie Pulliam, baritone Luke Sutliff, and bass Insung Sim, along with the Dallas Symphony Chorus led by chorus director Anthony Blake Clark and the Dallas Symphony Children’s Chorus directed by Ellie Lin (May 15 & 17).
Luisi conducts three other sets of performances with the DSO this season. A program dedicated to the folk music of Eastern Europe features young violin virtuoso Amaryn Olmeda, winner of both first prize and the audience choice award at the 24th Annual Sphinx Competition. She plays Miklós Rózsa’s Violin Concerto, which the DSO has not performed for 70 years, on a program with Bartók’s Romanian Folk Dances and a selection of Brahms’s Hungarian Dances (March 26–28). An all-Russian program follows in the spring, with Glinka’s Overture to Ruslan and Ludmila, Tchaikovsky’s “Little Russian” Symphony No. 2, and Stravinsky’s Firebird Suite (April 30–May 3). Later in May, Luisi conducts Mozart’s “Haffner” Symphony No. 35 along with three showcases: violinist Nathan Olson is featured in Bach’s E major Violin Concerto, trumpeter Stuart Stephenson performs Haydn’s E-flat Trumpet Concerto, and soprano Kathryn Henry is featured in the Beethoven concert aria “Ah, perfido!” (May 7, 9, 10).
Danish National Symphony Orchestra
Like the Dallas Symphony Orchestra, the DNSO also celebrates a milestone this season: its 100th anniversary. Upcoming on Deutsche Grammophon, Luisi and the DNSO will record Schoenberg’s complete orchestral works, honoring the 150th anniversary of the composer’s birth. As a preview of that project, they performed Schoenberg’s Ode to Napoleon Buonaparte and A Survivor from Warsaw this past fall, and in the spring they follow that up with Schoenberg’s Pelleas und Melisande. Also on the program, soprano Sara Jakubiak sings Wagner’s Wesendonck Songs, five settings of poems by Mathilde Wesendonck, the wife of one of the composer’s patrons. Wagner indicated that two of the songs were “studies” containing musical material that would later be further developed for his opera Tristan und Isolde (April 24 & 25). Luisi’s collaboration with the DNSO was recently lauded by MusicWeb International, after their recent release of Scriabin’s complete orchestral works. Praising the “uniformly excellent” performances, the review concluded: “A new Scriabin set then for the 2020s, I think, offering superb sound and excellent ensemble, articulation and vision throughout the whole set … now my number one recommendation for these works.” Luisi and the orchestra’s complete set of Nielsen symphonies was likewise widely acclaimed, with their recording of Symphonies Nos. 4 & 5 singled out for Gramophone’s Orchestral Award and Recording of the Year in 2023.
Guest conducting engagements
Luisi spent nine years at the helm of Zurich Opera, and this season he returns to the company to conduct a rarity: Paul Hindemith’s Cardillac, based on a novella by E.T.A. Hoffmann about a jeweler so obsessed by his own extravagant creations that he murders the buyers to get his pieces back. A milestone in the development of musical theater, the tale of artistic obsessiveness is newly staged by Hungarian theater and film director Kornél Mundruczó, and stars Gábor Bretz, Anett Fritsch, Michael Laurenz, Stanislav Vorobyov, Sebastian Kohlhepp, Dorottya Lang, and Brent Michael Smith (Feb 15–March 10).
A second opera engagement for Luisi takes place in the spring, when he leads a production of Verdi’s Simon Boccanegra at Amsterdam’s Dutch National Opera, starring Romanian baritone George Petean in the title role and Italian soprano Federica Lombardi as Amelia, in a new production by Dutch director Jetske Mijnssen (June 4–28). Luisi leads the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra for the production, and during the run of the opera the orchestra also gives performances under Luisi’s baton of Beethoven’s cheerful and comparatively compact Symphony No. 8, juxtaposed with two more reflective American works: Copland’s Quiet City and Barber’s Violin Concerto, with James Ehnes as soloist (June 11 & 12).
Two other winter guest conducting engagements in Italy round out Luisi’s season. He again conducts Beethoven’s Eighth Symphony, which he considers unjustly neglected, with Milan’s Filarmonica della Scala, along with Weber’s Overture to Oberon and Bruch’s Violin Concerto, featuring soloist Janine Jansen (Feb 23). A month later, he heads to Naples to lead the Teatro di San Carlo Orchestra in a program pairing Mozart’s “Haffner” Symphony with Mahler’s Fourth Symphony (March 22).
Fabio Luisi: winter/spring 2026 engagements
Jan 9 & 11
Dallas, TX
Dallas Symphony Orchestra
Jennifer Rowley (Butterfly)
Evan LeRoy Johnson (Pinkerton)
Manuela Custer (Suzuki)
Alessandro Luongo (Sharpless)
Keith Jameson (Goro)
Kidon Choi (Yamadori & Bonze)
Dallas Symphony Chorus (Anthony Blake Clark, director)
Paul Curran (stage director)
PUCCINI: Madama Butterfly, opera-in-concert
Jan 15 & 16
Dallas, TX
Dallas Symphony Orchestra
BRUCKNER Symphony No. 9 (1896, unfinished)
Feb 15–March 10
Zurich, Switzerland
Opernhaus Zürich
HINDEMITH: Cardillac
Feb 23
Milan, Italy
Filarmonica della Scala
Janine Jansen, violin
WEBER: Overture to Oberon, J. 306
BRUCH: Concerto No. 1 in G minor for violin and orchestra, Op. 26
BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 8 in F, Op. 93
March 22
Naples, Italy
Teatro di San Carlo
Orchestra del Teatro di San Carlo
Marina Monzó, soprano
MOZART: Symphony No. 35 in D, “Haffner,” K. 385
MAHLER: Symphony No. 4 in G
March 26–28
Dallas, TX
Dallas Symphony Orchestra
Amaryn Olmeda, violin
RÓZSA: Violin Concerto, Op. 24
BARTÓK: Romanian Folk Dances
BRAHMS: Selection of Hungarian Dances
March 31–April 2
Tour with Dallas Symphony Orchestra
Hélène Grimaud, piano
Sofia Fomina, soprano
SCHUMANN: Piano Concerto
MAHLER: Symphony No. 4 in G
March 31: Palm Desert, CA
April 1: Santa Barbara, CA
April 2: Costa Mesa, CA
April 11 & 12
Tokyo, Japan
NHK Hall
NHK Symphony Orchestra
Jan Vogler, cello
HAYDN: Cello Concerto No. 1 C, Hob. VIIb-1
BRUCKNER: Symphony No. 9 in D minor
April 16 & 17
Tokyo, Japan
Suntory Hall
NHK Symphony Orchestra
Kenji Matsumoto (Principal Clarinet, NHKSO)
MOZART: Clarinet Concerto in A, K. 622
MAHLER: Symphony No. 5 in C-sharp minor
April 24 & 25
Copenhagen, Denmark
Sara Jakubiak, soprano
WAGNER: Wesendonck Songs
SCHOENBERG: Pelleas und Melisande
April 30–May 3
Dallas, TX
Dallas Symphony Orchestra
GLINKA: Overture to Ruslan and Ludmila
TCHAIKOVSKY: Symphony No. 2, “Little Russian”
STRAVINSKY: The Firebird Suite (1945 version)
May 7, 9, 10
Dallas, TX
Dallas Symphony Orchestra
Nathan Olson, violin
Stuart Stephenson, trumpet
Kathryn Henry, soprano
BEETHOVEN: “Ah, perfido!” Scene and Aria for soprano and orchestra
BACH: Violin Concerto in E
HAYDN: Trumpet Concerto in E-flat
MOZART: Symphony No. 35 in D, “Haffner,” K. 385
May 15 & 17
Dallas, TX
Dallas Symphony Orchestra
Dallas Symphony Chorus & Baltimore Choral Arts (Anthony Blake Clark, chorus director)
Dallas Symphony Children’s Chorus (Ellie Lin, artistic director)
Rachel Willis Sørensen, soprano
Meghan Kasanders, soprano
Deanna Breiwick, soprano
Olesya Petrova, mezzo-soprano
Renée Tatum, mezzo-soprano
Limmie Pulliam, tenor
Luke Sutliff, baritone
Brindley Sherratt, bass-baritone
MAHLER Symphony No. 8, “Symphony of a Thousand”
June 4–28
Amsterdam, Netherlands
Dutch National Opera & Ballet
Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra
VERDI: Simon Boccanegra
June 11 & 12
Amsterdam, Netherlands
Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra
James Ehnes, violin
COPLAND: Quiet City
BARBER: Violin Concerto
BEETHOVEN: Symphony No. 8