American Composers Orchestra to Mark 50th Anniversary at Carnegie Hall
Programming includes conductors Kedrick Armstrong, Ray Chew, and José Luis Gómez, plus a new album with Platoon.
The American Composers Orchestra (ACO) has announced its 2026-2027 season, marking the launch of a 50th Anniversary celebration that will span two full seasons, beginning now and continuing through the 2027-2028 season. Founded in 1977 by a collective of fearless New York City musicians, ACO remains an ensemble dedicated to the creation, celebration, performance, and promotion of orchestral music by American composers. Celebrating 50 years committed to artistry, creativity, community, and equity, ACO presents an expansive slate of programming that reflects ACO's growth into a national institution, cultivating the careers of living composers and providing a direct pipeline to partnerships with major symphony orchestras across the country.
ACO's monumental 50th anniversary season includes its annual series presented by Carnegie Hall, the continuation of its partnership with Platoon on the regular release of commercial recordings celebrating the orchestra's commissioned works; the relaunch of VOX American Voices Opera Lab at Perelman Arts Center in partnership with six NYC-based arts organizations; a special appearance at Carnegie Hall with acclaimed composer and conductor Ray Chew and the sixth installment of A Night of Inspiration; National EarShot Readings with Nashville Symphony, Tucson Symphony Orchestra, and Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, as well as ACO itself; EarShot CoLABoratory Workshops with D-Composed and ACO; an 8-week residency at Kaufman Music Center Residency in NYC; and regional orchestral premieres of Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation Orchestral Commission works with partner orchestras nationwide.
ACO Artistic Director Curtis Stewart shares, “We are excited to begin the celebrations of ACO's 50-year legacy of supporting the future of American orchestral music through our work in EarShot, CoLABoratory, and our many orchestral partnerships around the country and the world. The concert programs for this upcoming year feature our work in its many shapes and sizes, from the new concerto commissioning project (Re)Loading the Canon, tapping into the excitement that competition-style works so naturally inspire, to the next iteration of Hello America, bringing the vitality and relevance of contemporary American conversation to the concert stage. We hope this work allows new music to continue to become closer to the center of American orchestral music in vital and sustaining ways.”
Carnegie Hall continues its 39th annual presentation of the American Composers Orchestra in two featured performances in the 2026-2027 season. First, Hello, America: We Gather Here, led by Kedrick Armstrong on Tuesday, October 27, 2026 at 7:30 PM at Carnegie Hall's Zankel Hall, which brings together electric violinist Tracy Silverman, đàn bầu and đàn tranh player Vân-Ánh Vanessa Võ, and clarinetist Andrzej Ciepliński in an evening reflecting on ways American music allows us to gather inside and outside the concert hall. The program includes the New York premiere of Daniel Bernard Roumain's America, To Us for electric violin and orchestra; the world premiere of Oswald Huỳnh's ngủ ngon for Vietnamese traditional instruments and orchestra; the world premiere of Alexander Timofeev's Fantasme No. 2; the world premiere of Mali Irene's Deliverance for orchestra and community music-making; the US premiere of Alex Weiser's Tfiles for clarinet and orchestra; and Thea Musgrave's Song of the Enchanter. These new works explore the ways in which music is designed to bring people together in specific settings, from memorials and weddings to town halls and street dances. Music from these gatherings reframes the idea of a "concert," offering a unique window into this nearly universal human experience.
In tandem with the October 27, 2026 performance, American Composers Orchestra will host its 2026 Gala & Creative Catalyst Awards at Carnegie Hall's Weill Terrace the same evening, honoring composer Thea Musgrave and Ralph Bumbaca, TD Bank, U.S. EVP, Regional President of Metro NY. Featuring a cocktail hour and seated dinner, the gala benefits ACO EarShot composer advancement programs, orchestral performances, and educational initiatives.
ACO returns to Carnegie Hall on Thursday, March 18, 2027 at 7:30 PM for New Virtuoso: Low End Theory, led by José Luis Gómez and featuring violist Jordan Bak and cellist Tommy Mesa. The program includes the New York premiere of Stephen Hartke's Da Pacem for cello and orchestra; the world premiere of Malachi Brown's From Birth.; the world premiere of Horacio Fernández's Tumbao; the New York premiere of Michael Frazier's los quetzales for viola and orchestra; and the world premiere of Laura Ortman's Unsurrenderable Glisten of the Ices for orchestra and electronics. ACO's New Virtuoso series interrogates the popular association between “higher, faster, louder” and virtuosity. In this program, the ensemble explores virtuosity on the lower, richer, slower end of the sonic spectrum, exploring the concept of virtuosity itself and how it interacts with what we value both on and off the stage.
ACO continues its multi-year partnership with Platoon, through which six additional innovative programs will be commercially released on all major digital platforms this season, bringing these new works to an international audience. The first release of the partnership featured the world premiere recording of Huang Ruo's An American Soldier, released in May 2025 to critical acclaim and later garnering a GRAMMY nomination for Best Opera Performance, the first-ever nomination for an American Composers Orchestra recording. The second issue, America in Weimar: On the Margins, was released on July 24, 2026 and led by conductor and pianist Rei Hotoda, featuring works by iconic American composers George Antheil, Duke Ellington, and Kurt Weill, alongside new works by John Glover and Kelley Rourke, Tonia Ko, and Jerod Impichchaachaaha' Tate, with performances by Forrópera (Chrystal E. Williams, mezzo-soprano & Felipe Hostins, accordion).
Forthcoming projects include 2023 EarShot Readings, featuring works by Daniel Reza Sabzghabaei, Younje Cho, Oswald Huỳnh, Henry Dorn, Amy Nam, and Brittany J. Green led by Tito Muñoz, out Friday, August 21, 2026 on all digital platforms, as well as Modern Yesterdays, featuring works by Carlos Bandera, Carlos Simon, and Kaki King led by Daniela Candillari, out September 18, 2026; 2024 EarShot Readings, featuring works by Anuj Bhutani, Malachi Brown, Eunsung Kim, Steven R. Gerber, Madeline Merwin, Sofía Scheps, and Samuel Torres led by Delta David Gier, out October 16, 2026; New Canons, featuring works by Trevor New and Ray Lustig led by Peter Askim, out January 22, 2027; The Natural Order, featuring works by inti figgis-vizueta and Yvette Janine Jackson led by Mei-Ann Chen, out February 19, 2027; and Sonic Festival, featuring music by Trevor New led by David Bloom, out March 19, 2027.
The relaunch of VOX, the initiative launched in 1999 by New York City Opera to incubate grand-scale new opera by contemporary American composers, brings together a coalition of New York City organizations committed to supporting the future of opera: American Composers Orchestra, Beth Morrison Projects, MasterVoices, The Metropolitan Opera's Lindemann Young Artist Development Program, Mannes Opera (The New School), the Manhattan School of Music Vocal Arts Division, and Perelman Performing Arts Center (PAC NYC).
On Monday, November 16, 2026 at 7:00 PM, VOX is featured at Works & Process at the Guggenheim in the Peter B. Lewis Theater at The Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum. The program introduces the coalition behind the relaunch and presents highlights of newly written works by composers selected through an open call, with a reception in the rotunda to follow.
On Thursday, April 1, 2027 at 7:00 PM, American Composers Orchestra performs in the culminating presentation at PAC NYC, where VOX showcases four in-process works of scale, offering a rare platform for artists from across the country to present new creations. The performance consists of book-in-hand concert presentations of 20- to 30-minute excerpts from each opera, performed with soloists, full orchestra, and chorus.
On Saturday, December 5, 2026 at 8:00 PM at Stern Auditorium / Perelman Stage at Carnegie Hall, ACO performs as the orchestra for A Night of Inspiration, an uplifting, joyful evening of music, dance, and spoken word from diverse traditions, featuring an all-star lineup of artists under the direction of Ray Chew – acclaimed composer, producer, and music director of Dancing with the Stars, the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, Showtime at The Apollo, and more – with co-producer Vivian Scott Chew.
ACO serves as Kaufman Music Center's 2026-2027 Artist-in-Residence. Over the course of the season, the orchestra leads improvisation and composition workshops, masterclasses, and chamber music and string orchestra coaching with students from Special Music School and Lucy Moses School, led by ACO Artistic Director Curtis Stewart alongside CoLABoratory composers Josh Henderson, Matthew Jamal, and Marie A. Douglas , culminating in world premieres on the Merkin Hall stage. The residency includes two public performances: Mentor Sessions: American Composers Orchestra (April 8, 2027), featuring premieres of works developed by Kaufman Music Center students through ACO's Sonic Spark Lab and CoLABoratory programs; and CoLAB: Experiments in Community – American Composers Orchestra (May 18, 2027), part of the Artist As Curator series, featuring a world premiere by Josh Henderson with the W4RP Trio, performed side-by-side by ACO and student string players, a world premiere by Matthew Jamal, and commissions by composers from across the Kaufman Music Center community.
American Composers Orchestra's signature EarShot Readings continue nationally in the 2026-2027 season, including partnerships with the Nashville Symphony, Tucson Symphony Orchestra, and Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, as well as ACO's own readings in NYC. Frazier's los quetzales, which receives its New York premiere at Carnegie Hall this season, was commissioned as part of (Re)Loading the Canon, a commissioning consortium of American Composers Orchestra's EarShot program that is focused on growing a collection of virtuosic, eight-minute concertos for violin, viola, cello, and bass by Black and Latino composers. These works can function as pairings with standard repertoire or as single, competition-style works, and the project continues to expand its repertoire across the orchestra. The consortium engages conservatories, orchestras, festivals, and young artist competitions, bringing together soloists, faculty, composers, administrators, students, and audiences to examine questions of canonization, identity, and vitality in classical music. Partner institutions have included The Juilliard School, Northwestern University's Bienen School of Music, the Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester, the Curtis Institute of Music, the Sphinx Organization, and Concert Artists Guild.
Encompassing all of ACO's composer advancement initiatives, EarShot is the first ongoing, systematic program to develop relationships between composers and orchestras nationwide. Serving over 430 composers since its inception, EarShot began in NYC with new music Readings in 1991. It expanded in 2008 to national Readings in partnership with orchestras nationwide, in collaboration with the League of American Orchestras, New Music USA, and American Composers Forum. EarShot now includes orchestral readings, CoLABoratory residencies, professional development, commissioning/consortia, and publishing. Its goal is to broaden the definition and role of the composer and build replicable models for co-created projects between composers, artists, and community partners. Artistic projects developed via EarShot are a key component of ACO's concert programming. ACO's EarShot programs serve as replicable models for organizations nationwide seeking to undertake similar work. Since 2009, more than 25 works have been commissioned by partner orchestras from EarShot participants, and more than half of selected EarShot composers report receiving a commission directly resulting from their participation. EarShot has also included the Jazz Composers Orchestra Institute, CoLABoratory, Pathways, and more. EarShot Readings alumni have gone on to win every major composition award, including Pulitzer, GRAMMY, Grawemeyer, American Academy of Arts and Letters, and Rome Prizes.
On October 20 and 21, 2026, the Nashville Symphony will workshop new works by composers Alexander Reams, Dean Kervin Boursiquot, Jackson A. Waters, and Michelle Lorimer, supported by mentor composers Anthony Davis, Nina Shekhar, and Dave Ragland. On October 27-28, 2026, the Tucson Symphony Orchestra partners with the University of Arizona to host EarShot Readings featuring new works by Aidan Vass, Marie Blix, Adam Harrington, and David Vess, mentored by composers Dan Coleman, Vincent Calianno, and Jimmy Lopez. On January 20 and 21, 2027, the Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra hosts EarShot Readings led by mentor composers Patrice Rushen, Damien Geter, and Jonathan Bailey Holland. Readings are planned with the American Composers Orchestra in NYC on June 17 and 18, 2027, at the DiMenna Center for Classical Music, with additional details to be announced.
EarShot CoLABoratory Residencies continue to advance the work of composers whose music is experimental or rooted in underrepresented traditions. The 2026-2027 season includes workshops with ACO at The DiMenna Center for Classical Music on August 24, 2026, featuring Kian Ravaei, Jordyn Davis, and Horacio Fernández; September 9, 2026, featuring Andreia Pinto-Correia and Nathan Schram; October 28, 2026, featuring Malachi Brown; March 17, 2027 featuring Terminus Sketches by Marie A. Douglas; and March 19, 2027, featuring new work by Josh Henderson. An additional workshop is planned with D-Composed, with further details to be announced.
American Composers Orchestra continues its partnership with the League of American Orchestras on the Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation Orchestral Commissions Program in 2026-2027, with regional premieres and repeat performances continuing across the country. Commissioned works receiving performances this season include Brittany J. Green's TESTIFY! (Wisconsin Chamber Orchestra, Amarillo Symphony), Leanna Primiani's Visions (ROCO), Melody Eötvös's Red Dirt | Silver Rain (Stanford Philharmonia), Stacy Garrop's CHROMA (Lexington Philharmonic, Johnstown Symphony Orchestra), Niloufar Iravani's Reflections (Valdosta Symphony Orchestra), Xi Wang's Lotus Prayer (Westerville Symphony), Hilary Purrington's Words for Departure (Mankato Symphony), Moni Jasmine Guo's the sound of where i came from (乡音 Xiāng Yīn) (Bangor Symphony Orchestra), Marina López's Moño (Arkansas Symphony Orchestra), Andrea Reinkemeyer's Water Sings Fire (Greenville Symphony), Courtney Bryan's Rejoice (Dayton Philharmonic Orchestra), and Chen-Hui Jen's in eternal dusk (Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra).
