Discover the 2025/26 season
Dear audience,
our new season offers many star performances - and numerous discoveries.
Three musicians in particular will shape the concert programmes of the 2025/26 season: As a focus artist, cellist Sol Gabetta will not only perform four cello concertos, she will also present a recital with violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja and join forces with our cello repertoire. The second focus artist is pianist Kirill Gerstein, who thrilled Zurich audiences two years ago when he stood in for Igor Levit; in addition to piano concertos by Rachmaninov and Ravel, he will also perform works by British composer, conductor and pianist Thomas Adès, who will take over the Creative Chair. Over the course of the season, numerous orchestral and chamber music works will be performed by Adès, who will also conduct his own piano concerto and sit behind the keys in a recital together with Kirill Gerstein.
Paavo Järvi will continue his Mahler cycle with the Symphonies No. 2 and the Adagio from the fragmentary No. 10, which will also be recorded. He is also launching a new concert and recording project with works by the Swiss composer Arthur Honegger. He will also conduct two concerts to mark the 90th birthday of composer Arvo Pärt, with whom he has been associated since his childhood - one with the Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich and one with the Estonian Festival Orchestra.
Numerous former Focus artists return to our stage, including Janine Jansen, Lisa Batiashvili, Hélène Grimaud, Ksenija Sidorova, Iveta Apkalna, Fazıl Say, Avi Avital, Martin Fröst and Víkingur Ólafsson. Igor Levit, Hilary Hahn and Augustin Hadelich will also be performing as soloists. Among the conductors, we look forward to renewed collaborations with Philippe Jordan, Franz Welser-Möst, Marek Janowski, Alondra de la Parra and other long-standing allies. There will also be four conducting debuts: in addition to Thomas Adès, French conductor Marie Jacquot, pianist András Schiff and Florian Helgath, director of the Zurich Singakademie, will conduct the orchestra for the first time.
We can also be found outside the Tonhalle Zurich: very close by, when we bring the chamber music series "Kunterwunderbunt" to Zurich's community centres. And further afield on tours that take us to Baden-Baden and Vienna, for the first time to La Scala in Milan and again to South Korea and Japan.
Under the motto "Classic meets ...", we cross borders in all possible directions. In the "classic meets art" series, our musicians perform at Hauser und Wirth and in museums. We will continue the film symphony and literature and music series in the coming season. The tonhalleLATE and tonhalleCRUSH formats will also be continued.
And what else? The musicians have once again come up with attractive programmes for the chamber music series. Young talents can be discovered in the Série jeunes. And the "Connect" inclusion project, in which we offer dance training for people with Parkinson's and multiple sclerosis together with other institutions, has become firmly established.
If you would like to know more about our plans - Artistic Director Ilona Schmiel and Music Director Paavo Järvi tell us in an interview. In our stories you will find lots of interesting, entertaining and surprising facts about our concerts. Y
ou can discover everything else by browsing through the season programme or clicking through the concert calendar here on our website.
Subscriptions can be booked now - the inexpensive trial subscription for anyone who has never had a subscription before is also on offer again. Single tickets go on sale on 18 August 2025 at 1 pm.
