The Sarasota Music Festival Views History Through a Musical Lens

TheSarasota Music Festival announced its concert programs for the 2025 Festival season, exploring the theme of “Music as a Mirror of History.” The three-week Festival runs from June 1 – 21 with 14 different concerts and events, as well as a wide range of masterclasses, coaching sessions, and open rehearsals.

More than 400 pre-professional musicians from the world’s top music programs at colleges and conservatories audition for the Festival, with approximately 60 applicants accepted for fellowships each year. Fellows work side-by-side with a group of 40 faculty artists who represent many of the most renowned music schools and professional orchestras.

“We are deeply honored this June to present audiences a unique opportunity to view the history of the last several hundred years through the lens of music, and also to view music through the lens of history,” says Festival Music Director Jeffrey Kahane. “Each work on the Festival program will be a focal point of a journey I have carefully curated in the hopes of opening our eyes to the way that music allows us to travel in time and space without leaving our seat in the concert hall.”

Fellows and faculty artists will take turns narrating this exploration throughout the Festival. Featured composers include Richard Strauss, Franz Schubert and Dmitri Shostakovich, all represented by works that echo the monumental historical changes through which they lived.

Highlights of the 2025 Sarasota Music Festival include:

Tessa Lark Returns – Thursday, June 5 – 4:30 pm: Violinist Tessa Lark and cellist Mike Block join Jeffrey Kahane to reprise their 2024 Festival’s triumph of improvisation, this time using an Old English folk song. In her Festival debut, the versatile flutist Alex Sopp brings her talents to Heitor Villa-Lobos´ popular Assiobio a Játo (The Jet Whistle). Composer Michi Wiancko reflects on her musical experiences with her mother in the nostalgic Fantasia for Tomorrow.
From Bach To Block – Friday, June 6 – 7:30 pm: Festival faculty and fellows team up for Bach’s joyous Brandenburg Concerto No. 4, one of the great monuments of 18th-century music. Shostakovich dedicated his Piano Trio No. 2 to his dear departed friend Ivan Sollertinsky, harnessing Jewish folk idioms to honor his memory. Mike Block revisits his fascinating Global Music Collaboration, a unique cross-cultural experience reflecting live performance’s spontaneous magic.

Miró Quartet Plays Schubert – Thursday, June 12 – 4:30 pm: Composed in 1938, Henri Tomasi’s delightful Concert Champêtre ushers audiences into the elegant, stately world of 17th- and 18th-century courtly dance music. Icelandic cellist and SMF alum Sæunn Thorsteinsdóttir performs the fascinating Bow to String, composed especially for her by her countryman Daniel Bjarnason. Schubert’s String Quintet, composed during his final burst of inspiration, is brought to life by the GRAMMY®-nominated Miró Quartet, joined by Thorsteinsdóttir.
Heirloom – Friday, June 20 – 7:30 pm: The theme of music and memory takes center stage in the final Festival Friday. Richard Strauss’s powerful Metamorphosen, featuring 23 unique string parts, delves into a period of massive change in Germany. Singer-songwriter Gabriel Kahane, Jeffrey Kahane’s son, performs October 1, 1939/Port of Hamburg, based on his grandmother’s diary as she traveled across America in 1939 after fleeing Germany. Jeffrey Kahane is the soloist in Heirloom, the piano concerto his son composed and dedicated to him “with love, admiration, gratitude and awe.” Gabriel Kahane conducts this captivating and deeply personal work that intertwines three generations of family history.

About the Sarasota Music Festival:

For more than 60 years, internationally recognized faculty artists and pre-professional musicians have come together for the study and performance of chamber music at the Sarasota Music Festival. Festival audiences enjoy a wide variety of concert experiences, including faculty artist showcases, small-ensemble programs, full orchestra concerts, and fellow recitals. Many patrons enjoy the option of purchasing Festival Passes for access to masterclasses and rehearsals. This year’s theme, “Music as a Mirror of History,” highlights music’s ability to bring the past to life and allow listeners to contemplate their place in the world.

Additional information about the Sarasota Music Festival is available at http://www.sarasotaorchestra.org/festival. Patrons may reach the Box Office at (941) 953-3434.