BAM (Brooklyn Academy of Music) Unveils Fall 2026 Season and Next Wave

BAM (Brooklyn Academy of Music) has revealed its its Fall 2026 season and Next Wave, an slate of dance, theater, music, film, and family events.

At the heart of the season is Next Wave 2026, which lays the groundwork for the 50th anniversary of DanceAfrica, the nation's largest festival dedicated to African diasporic dance and music, arriving in May 2027. By providing a platform for African and African diasporic artists to create and showcase work that holds both historical legacy and Afrofuturist possibility, BAM honors the vision that choreographer and DanceAfrica founder Chuck Davis bequeathed to the institution. His work underscored one of the world's most profound truths: Africa is a wellspring of ancestry and history, and a diverse continent at the epicenter of contemporary questions including migration, human rights, social justice, and climate. That understanding runs through this season.

Okwui Okpokwasili, one of the defining voices in contemporary performance, appears in two works: adaku, part 2 with Peter Born, and the US premiere of Minor Music at the End of the World, written by Saidiya Hartman and featuring André Holland. Rwandan artists Dorothée Munyaneza and Dorcy Rugamba present works drawn from memory, loss, and survival. Nehprii Amenii makes her BAM debut with "HUMAN," and Bessie Award-winning choreographer Cynthia Oliver returns with, Turn. Turning. TURNT., a three-part evening on Black girlhood, survival, and re-emergence. Hanif Abdurraqib continues his poetry series into a third year, gathering Black poets and thinkers from Brooklyn and across the African diaspora. Together they mark a convergence, a creative inheritance that is foundational and forward-looking at once, and whose influence has long shaped culture around the world.

The season also brings longtime collaborators and first-time artists to Next Wave: the Philip Glass Ensemble performs Einstein on the Beach in concert for the opera’s 50th anniversary and anticipating Glass’s 90th birthday; Anne Bogart and Charles L. Mee reunite for the world premiere of PRELUDE, a site-specific outdoor work produced by En Garde Arts; Tiago Rodrigues returns to BAM for the third time with La Distance, the breakout hit of the 2025 Festival d'Avignon; and Guggenheim Fellows Holland Andrews and yuniya edi kwon make their BAM debuts. I'mPossible Holiday Wonders, Omnium Circus's radically inclusive holiday spectacular making its BAM debut in December.

The full fall season also includes The Ford/Hill Project, a verbatim theater work drawn from the Senate testimony of Anita Hill and Christine Blasey Ford, created by Elizabeth Marvel and Lee Sunday Evans; a conversation with bestselling author and organizational psychologist Adam Grant, in association with Greenlight Bookstore; plus Unworlding, NYC, a new series of public dialogues curated by BAM Artist-in-Residence and Curator Helga Davis, featuring conversations with renowned poet Claudia Rankine and critic Jack Halberstam.

Rounding out the season are BAM's fall film program across the Peter Jay Sharp and BAM KBH buildings, and BAMkids family programming.

Fall

Sep. 8–20 — The Ford/Hill Project by Elizabeth Marvel & Lee Sunday Evans (Theater)
Oct. 13 — Vibe: The Secrets of Strong Connections in a Lonely World by Adam Grant (Talk)
Oct. 13–15 — PRELUDE written by Charles L. Mee, directed by Anne Bogart (Theater)
Oct. 14 & 27 — Unworlding, NYC curated by Helga Davis, featuring Claudia Rankine and Jack Halberstam (Series)

Next Wave

Oct. 7–11 — Dorcy Rugamba’s Hewa Rwanda–Letter to the Absent (Theater/Music)
Oct. 21–25 — How Does It Feel to Look at Nothing by Holland Andrews & yuniya edi kwon (Music/Opera)
Oct. 23–24 — Toi, moi, Tituba… by Dorothée Munyaneza (Dance)
Oct. 24–30 — I Guess It Was My Destiny to Live So Long by Hanif Abdurraqib (Poetry)
Nov. 4–7 — Turn. Turning. TURNT. by Cynthia Oliver (Dance)
Nov. 11–15 — adaku, part 2 by Okwui Okpokwasili & Peter Born (Dance)
Nov. 18–29 — La Distance by Tiago Rodrigues (Theater)
Nov. 19–21 — Einstein on the Beach 50th Anniversary Concert by Philip Glass & Robert Wilson (Music)
Dec. 2–5 — Nehprii Amenii’s HUMAN, music by Martha Redbone & Aaron Whitby (Theater/Puppetry)
Dec. 4–6 — Minor Music at the End of the World written by Saidiya Hartman, directed by Sarah Benson (Theater)

Holiday

Dec. 10–13 — I’mPossible Holiday Wonders by Omnium Circus (Circus/Kids/Holiday)

Kids and Families

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