From M. Night Shyamalan to the return of Riccardo Muti, Philadelphia Orchestra’s new season promises ‘an event’ every night

Next season at the Philadelphia Orchestra, you can hear three Mahler symphonies or take in a musical evening hosted by M. Night Shyamalan. You might savor a concert version of Wagner’s four-hour Tristan und Isolde, or listen to Joe Hisaishi conducting his Suite from Hayao Miyazaki’s Spirited Away.

And of course, the orchestra in 2024-25 will present its traditional slate of works by Brahms, Berlioz, Dvořák, and Beethoven, the orchestra announced Thursday.

Next season continues the orchestra’s push to bring listeners back into the hall post-pandemic, and the goal in assembling it was creating the sense that every concert is an event, either because of a dash of celebrity, the format, artists and repertoire, or all of the above.

“We’ve been really intentional with every single program to make sure that there’s something special,” said Matías Tarnopolsky, president and CEO of the Philadelphia Orchestra and Kimmel Center, Inc.

One event stands out from the standouts: the return of Riccardo Muti. The Italian maestro, 82, has rarely led the orchestra since stepping down as music director in 1992, and for his concerts here in October he’ll conduct the Verdi Requiem, one of his signature works.

Musicians of the orchestra had pushed for his appearance here, said Tarnopolsky, “so I got on a plane to Chicago and he and I had a lovely lunch together. He said, ‘I would be delighted to come back and conduct the orchestra, which was my first American music directorship.’ And so it was interrupted by COVID, but finally we were able to schedule it with just an extraordinary piece of music.”

Film music continues to figure into the orchestra’s schedule, but with some intriguing new wrinkles. James Newton Howard leads the orchestra in excerpts from his scores to The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, Signs, The Village, and other films by Shyamalan, who hosts the special preseason concert in September.

In January 2025, Hisaishi, the renowned film composer, leads the orchestra in his Symphony No. 2, Saga for viola and orchestra, and the Suite from Spirited Away.

“Film music is a major part of orchestral culture in the 20th century and beyond,” said Tarnopolsky of the blossoming of film music on the orchestra’s schedule in recent years. “Given the Philadelphia Orchestra’s unique history in film music going back to Fantasia, we feel it’s important that contemporary approaches to film are reflected in our programming.”

Plus film brings in audiences — audiences that don’t necessarily attend regular subscription concerts. Two live-to-screen performances of Elf in December filled the hall to 96% of capacity.

As for how film scores score with the musicians of the orchestra, opinions vary, says Tarnopolsky.

“I think the winds and the brass tend to be more favorable than the strings, but that’s a generalization. Like all things, some people like it more than others.”

No film clips will be shown during the Hisaishi program; whether film will be a part of the Shyamalan evening hasn’t been decided. Additional live-to-screen film programs are expected to be announced at a later date, as are more orchestra concerts generally and performances at Carnegie Hall. As for the musicians themselves on film, the orchestra ended its regular schedule of pandemic-era Digital Stage concerts in 2022-23 and now offers only occasional online concert presentations, a spokesperson said.

Contemporary music fans will be able to hear more than a dozen works next season never before played by the orchestra, including Terence Blanchard’s Orchestral Suite from Fire Shut Up in My Bones in its world premiere (opening night, Sept. 26, led by Yannick Nézet-Séguin); Betsy Jolas’ Lassus ricercare and bTunes (Oct. 18-20, conductor David Robertson and pianist Nicolas Hodges); and Augusta Holmès’ “La Nuit et l’amour” (Interlude) from Ludus pro patria (Nov. 22 and 23, conductor Stéphane Denève).

Then, in 2025: Jake Heggie’s Songs for Murdered Sisters (Jan. 9 and 11, conductor Nézet-Séguin, baritone Joshua Hopkins); Kaija Saariaho’s Graal théâtre for violin and orchestra (Jan. 23-26, conductor Rafael Payare, violinist Carolin Widmann); Julia Wolfe’s Pretty (Feb. 27-March 1, conductor Nézet-Séguin); and, in its world premiere, Gabriela Lena Frank’s Picaflor (March 13-15, conductor Marin Alsop), based on a Peruvian creation myth.

Most if not all of these contemporary works are being programmed alongside works sure to please traditionalists: Tchaikovsky’s Romeo and Juliet (opening night); Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 2 (Sept. 27-29, conductor Nézet-Séguin, pianist Seong-Jin Cho); Saint-Saëns’s Symphony No. 3, the “Organ” (Oct. 11 and 13, conductor Roderick Cox); Beethoven’s Symphony No. 3 (March 7-9, conductor Michael Tilson Thomas); and the Shostakovich Symphony No. 5 (March 28 and 29, conductor Nathalie Stutzmann).

The three Mahler symphonies are spaced out over the season, and are all led by Nézet-Séguin: the Third, with mezzo Joyce DiDonato (Oct. 3-5); the Ninth (Jan. 9 and 11) and the Sixth (April 10-13).

The solo recital series recently launched by the Kimmel will continue in 2024-25, with three artists slated to appear in Verizon Hall: pianists Daniil Trifonov on Feb. 26 and Lang Lang on March 23, and violinist Hilary Hahn on May 17.

While such recitals in a hall as big as Verizon had trouble attracting an audience in the past, Tarnopolsky said that ticket sales for this season have so far been “fantastic.”

Among the guest soloists slated to appear with the orchestra next season are pianists Lara Downes, Yefim Bronfman, Yuja Wang, Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Hélène Grimaud, Haochen Zhang, and Emanuel Ax; violinists Gil Shaham, María Dueñas, Leonidas Kavakos, Randall Goosby, and Nikolaj Szeps-Znaider; and cellists Gautier Capuçon and Sheku Kanneh-Mason.

Wagner’s Tristan und Isolde promises to be a season high point, with Stuart Skelton and Nina Stemme, two reigning Wagnerians, in the title roles. The concert version of the opera will be performed twice in June 2025 (with two intermissions), its performances spaced a week apart. Why?

“Because it’s huge,” says Tarnopolsky. “For the singers and the musicians to perform four hours on one day to do it again the next day would be a lot. You can only run a marathon once a week.”

He called the orchestra’s concert performance of the opera “once-in-a-generation stuff.”

“Orchestras don’t do this on any kind of regular basis, so this is a history-making moment.”

Subscriptions on sale now at philorch.org, 215-893-1955. Single tickets go on sale in July.