Press room

Ahead of the Barbican’s classical music season opening on 9 September 2026 with Our Eyes Looking for God in The Pit, see below for a month-by-month calendar of the the centre’s autumn and winter own and co-promotion concerts.

Highlights include a Composer in Focus series with Caroline Shaw and an avant-garde festival curated by Elaine Mitchener MBE, alongside concert series, artist residencies and celebrations of major anniversaries, the forthcoming Barbican Classical Music season will showcase a wide range of some of the very best that music has to offer, welcoming new and returning audiences to the artform. 

For more information about any of the concerts included in the below calendar, please contact the Barbican’s music press team at [email protected]. 

For a full overview of the season, including series, residencies and programmes from Barbican artistic residents and associates the London Symphony Orchestra, BBC Symphony Orchestra, Academy of Ancient Music and Darbar, you can read the announcement from earlier this year here.

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SEPTEMBER 2026

• Our Eyes Looking For God (9-13 Sep 2026, 10 Sep 2026 Press Night) - Writer and theatre director TD Moyo collaborates with Ivor Novello award-winning composer Renell Shaw and librettist April Koyejo-Audiger to present Our Eyes Looking for God. Born from a 2020 Headlong commission, the opera, based on Moyo’s play Caspers,explores Black British identity, telling an urgent national story of state violence through joy, love, laughter and pain, while asking fundamental questions about who opera is for and whose stories it can tell. Starring acclaimed actor Gamba Cole (The Outlaws) and baritone Themba Mvula, Our Eyes Looking for God is the season opener and part of Concert Theatre.
• An Anatomy of Melancholy (16-20 Sep 2026) - In the year of John Dowland’s 400th anniversary An Anatomy of Melancholy returns to the Barbican following its world premiere in 2022. Created by ground-breaking director Netia Jones, the work features Iestyn Davies’s crystalline voice, Jones’s haunting visuals, lutenist Mónica Pustilnik and Dowland’s ravishingly bittersweet music in an intimate theatrical meditation on the consolations of sorrow, directed here by Emma Doherty. Part of Concert Theatre.
• Morton Feldman: Unsettled Memory with Eliza McCarthy & Friends (19 Sep 2026) - Pianist Eliza McCarthy presents an intimate evening spanning three decades of composer Morton Feldman’s work at LSO St Luke’s, joined by soprano Juliet Fraser, Apartment House and more. Part of LIMINAL.
• Roomful of Teeth with special guest Gabriel Kahane (22 Sep 2026) - Multi-GRAMMY award-winning vocal group Roomful of Teeth perform music from their latest collaboration album with Gabriel Kahane, Elevator Songs.

OCTOBER 2026

• Caroline Shaw & Pam Tanowitz: Pastoral (1-3 Oct 2026) - Caroline Shaw’s Composer in Focus residency begins with a major new collaboration between Shaw and celebrated choreographer Pam Tanowitz which receives its UK premiere in the Barbican Theatre. In Pastoral, Tanowitz strips away Beethoven's familiar Symphony No 6, replacing it, in part, with moments of silence, alongside a new composition by Shaw, a long-standing collaborator, which refracts, reimagines and transforms the original. Part of Concert Theatre and Caroline Shaw: Composer in Focus
• Scottish Ensemble: Bach & Blood (2 Oct 2026) - Scottish Ensemble begin their residency in a programme where every breath resonates and each string sings, joined by singers from the Chamber Choir of the National Youth Choir of Scotland. Part of Scottish Ensemble: Company-in-Residence.
• Attacca Quartet with Caroline Shaw (8 Oct 2026) - Revealing all facets of her dynamic musicianship, Caroline Shaw’s residency continues, joining forces with the Grammy Award-winning New York-based Attacca Quartet. Shaw will sing a selection of her songs with the ensemble, before joining them on viola to perform Mendelssohn’s String Quintet No 2 in B-flat major. The quartet will also give the UK premiere of John Adam’s Iron Jig – written for them by the composer. Part of Caroline Shaw: Composer in Focus.
• Isabelle Faust & Alexander Melnikov (10 Oct 2026) - Violinist Isabelle Faust begins her Barbican residency performing with Alexander Melnikov, her duo partner of two decades’ standing, in a programme of sonatas by Schumann and Brahms. Part of Isabelle Faust: Artist-in-Residence.
• Perle Noire: Meditations for Joséphine (20 Oct 2026) - Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Tyshawn Sorey, poet Claudia Rankine, director Peter Sellars and soprano Julia Bullock reimagine the songs of legendary artist, activist and icon, Joséphine Baker in the 120th year since her birth. The performance traces Baker’s journey from the segregated United States to international stardom in Paris through opera, jazz, spirituals and elegance. Part of Concert Theatre.

• ALWAYS, ALREADY THERE: the Afrodiasporic avant-garde festival curated by Elaine Mitchener MBE (23-25 Oct 2026) -

  A new festival celebrating experimental music by Afrodiasporic composers and musicians, taking place across the Barbican and Guildhall School. Curated by acclaimed vocalist, movement artist and composer Elaine Mitchener MBE, the weekend marks the first-ever UK event dedicated to avant-garde music by artists of African heritage. 

  Bringing together an exceptional line-up of artists, the weekend will see original performances from the likes of Pamela Z, Pat Thomas, NikNak, Aaron Azunda Akugbo, Chiron Choir, Gweneth-Ann Rand, Thomas Randle, Apartment House, and the newly-formed Always, Already There Ensemble, with further events including free pre-concert talks to be announced. Audiences will encounter music by pioneering figures as well as contemporary voices, from Lijadu Sisters, Alice Coltrane, Olly Wilson and Anthony Braxton to Hannah Kendall, Ayanna Witter-Johnson and Charles Uzor. Read full press release here.

• Hannah Peel: Double Bill (23 & 24 Oct 2026) -

  PIA by Katya Bourvis in collaboration with Tala Lee-Turton and Hannah Peel (23 Oct 2026) -PIA is a brand-new live music and dance production by choreographer Katya Bourvis in collaboration with creative producer Tala Lee-Turton and set to awardwinning composer and multi-instrumentalist Hannah Peel’s 7-movement odyssey: Mary Casio: Journey to Cassiopeia (2017), performed live by a 17-piece brass band. Part of Concert Theatre and LIMINAL. 

  Hannah Peel & Beibei Wang: The Endless Dance (24 Oct 2026) - Award-winning composer and multi-instrumentalist Hannah Peel appears in the Barbican Hall with internationally acclaimed percussionist Beibei Wang for a performance of their forthcoming album: The Endless Dance, a new work that traces the 24 solar terms of the Chinese calendar through electronics and percussion. Part of LIMINAL.

• Colin Currie Group: Steve Reich Celebration (28 Oct 2026) - A major new co-commission for double sextet receives its London premiere performed by the Colin Currie Group. Part of Steve Reich at 90.
• Jasdeep Singh Degun & Sukhvinder “Pinky” Singh (28 Oct 2026) - Sitar player Jasdeep Singh Degun, the first British Asian musician to win the Royal Philharmonic Society’s Instrumentalist award, joins forces with one of today’s top tabla players starting his residency at the Barbican in the long-running Darbar Festival of Indian Classical Music. Part of Jasdeep Singh Degun: Artist-in-Residence and Darbar Festival 2026.
• Ringdown: Caroline Shaw and Danni Lee Parpan (29 Oct 2026) - Shaw and Parpan’s electronic duo Ringdown returns to the Barbican with songs from their 2025 debut record Lady on the Bike, performed in the church of St Giles. With much of their work written while the duo themselves fell in love, they’ve said: ‘We joke and say that our greatest wish is that this music might make two people fall in love. So please make the first move and send our songs to your crush’. Part of Caroline Shaw: Composer in Focus.
• The Listeners with BBC Symphony Orchestra (30 Oct 2026) - The BBC Symphony Orchestra and conductor Dalia Stasevska present composer Caroline Shaw’s shimmering oratorio The Listeners in which her intensely communicative music carries the words of Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson and Carl Sagan into a future bounded only by our imagination, and our courage. Part of Caroline Shaw: Composer in Focus.
• Jlin + Third Coast Percussion: Vernacular (31 Oct 2026) - Grammy Award-winning percussion ensemble Third Coast Percussion and Pulitzer Prize-finalist composer, performer and electronic musician Jlin join forces in a programme that explores the evolution of their decade-long partnership. The programme includes a new work commissioned by 92Y that will bring all five musicians together live, conjuring an entirely new sonic universe. Part of LIMINAL.

NOVEMBER 2026

• Sinfonia of London: Benjamin Grosvenor and Scheherazade (6 Nov 2026) - In the first of two concerts at the Barbican this season, the Sinfonia of London are joined by British pianist Benjamin Grosvenor to perform one of the most popular pieces of classical music: Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2. The orchestra start the evening with Polish composer Grażyna Bacewicz’ 1948 Concerto for String Orchestra and conclude with another fan favourite: Rimsky-Korsakov’s Scheherazade.
• Tristan Perich & James McVinnie: Infinity Gradient (6 & 7 Nov 2026) - Organist James McVinnie performs Tristan Perich’s Infinity Gradient. In the church of St Giles Cripplegate, across the Barbican Lakeside, pipe organ will join forces with 4 subs, 24 medium and 72 small speakers splayed across the performance space in this piece for organ and 100 speakers in 1-bit audio.
• Ensemble Pygmalion: Mozart's Great Mass in C minor (9 Nov 2026) - Ensemble Pygmalion and conductor Raphaël Pichon celebrate 20 years of impactful music-making and period performance with Mozart’s Great Mass in C minor as well as music by Schubert and Bruckner.
• London Symphony Orchestra/Susanna Mälkki (12 Nov 2026) - The Barbican’s Resident Orchestra and conductor Susanna Mälkki performs Three Movements, Music for Large Ensemble, Variations, and Music for Ensemble and Orchestra. Part of Steve Reich at 90.
• Apollo’s Fire with Jeanette Sorrell & Jeanine De Bique: Echoes Across the Atlantic (28 Nov 2026) - Grammy award-winning ensemble Apollo's Fire and founder-director Jeannette Sorrell join with legendary Trinidadian soprano, Jeanine De Bique, exploring the connections between Europe and the colonies of the Caribbean during the 18th century. Tales of love, despair, and resilience emerge from the palaces of Europe and the plantations of the Caribbean through music by Handel, Purcell, Rameau and Vivaldi and the voices of Caribbean poets – with surprising resonances for today.   
   

DECEMBER 2026

• Explore Ensemble with Beatrice Dillon (1 Dec 2026) - New music group Explore Ensemble present the world premiere of Where Never a new Barbican-commissioned work for sextet by artist and composer Beatrice Dillon alongside Dillon’s Seven Reorganisations and works by Helmut Lachenmann, and Pascale Criton.
• Colin Currie & GSMD: Music for 18 Musicians (2 Dec 2026) - One of Steve Reich’s seminal works, performed by Colin Currie side by side with Guildhall School of Music and Drama musicians, joined by Richard Benjafield (percussion) and Robin Michaels (cello), with supporting live visuals from the GSMD Production Arts department. Part of Steve Reich at 90.
• BBC Symphony Orchestra/Oramo/Power (4 Dec 2026) - Violist Lawrence Power begins his Barbican residency with the BBC SO performing the London premier of Anders Hillborg’s Viola Concerto in a programme that also includes Mendelssohn’s The First Walpugisnacht and Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring. Part of Lawrence Power: Artist-in-Residence.
• Messiah: Re-Imagined (10 Dec 2026) - A bold new interpretation of Handel's Messiah, reimagined for the 21st century. For the first time, the traditional arias and choruses from the Messiah take on a striking new resonance, interspersed with newly created music inspired by Quincy Jones’ groundbreaking album: Messiah - A Soulful Celebration. Performed by the BBC Singers and Serafine Sinfonia, conducted by Tom Randle.
• Sam Green x Caroline Shaw: Trees with the LSO (14 Dec 2026) - Oscar-nominated filmmaker Sam Green unites with Pulitzer Prize–winning composer Caroline Shaw and award-winning author and environmentalist Rebecca Solnit to present the world premiere of Trees: a live orchestral film with an original score composed by Shaw performed by the London Symphony Orchestra. Part of Caroline Shaw: Composer in Focus.
• Bach Collegium Japan - Handel’s Messiah (15 Dec 2026) - One of the world’s foremost period performance ensembles, Bach Collegium Japan and Principal Conductor Masato Suzuki, return to the Barbican to perform Handel’s Messiah. Using instruments and techniques that, as close as possible, reflect those Handel himself would have known, this performance of the universally appealing oratorio is a Christmas season favourite.

JANUARY 2026

• The National Youth Orchestra (8 Jan 2027) - 160 young musicians from across the UK explore the expanse of the universe and the hidden secrets of the human heart in early 2027, at the Barbican with a performance of Zimmer’s Interstellar Suite and Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No 5
• Beatrice Rana in Recital (15 Jan 2027) - Combining emotion, imagination and technique, Italian pianist Beatrice Rana gives a varied recital of Bach’s Italian Concerto, Clementi’s Piano Sonata in G minor, Op 50 No 3, and Robert Schumann’s Carnaval Op 9.