Classical Music & Dance

Kansas City Symphony to return with full schedule, full audiences in September

The Kansas City Symphony has announced a full 2021-22 season featuring in-person, full-capacity audiences at the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts after losing its 2020-21 season to the pandemic.

The symphony resumed in-person concerts this spring with limited audiences of subscribers in Helzberg Hall at the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts. It will kick off the new 29-date season Sept. 24-26 with music by Beethoven, Mahler and the world premiere of a piano concerto by Gabriel Kahane. Music director Michael Stern will conduct.

Stern announced in 2019 that he would step away from his position after 18 years after the 2022-23 season. The symphony said at the time that candidates to be the new music director would guest conduct during 2021-22, and 12 guest conductors are on the schedule.

Michael Stern will step away from his position as music director of the Kansas City Symphony after the 2022-23 season.
Michael Stern will step away from his position as music director of the Kansas City Symphony after the 2022-23 season. David Bickley File photo

The core of the season is 14 Classical Series programs, with a smattering of Pops, Family and Holiday concerts — including Handel’s Messiah. Also, three of the symphony’s popular Film and Live Orchestra concerts are slated: “Home Alone,” “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix” and “Star Wars: Return of the Jedi.”

See kcsymphony.org for more details on the season. Season subscribers have until July 15 to renew or upgrade their subscriptions.

Dan Kelly
The Kansas City Star
Dan Kelly has been covering entertainment and arts news at The Star since 2009. He previously worked at the Columbia Daily Tribune, The Miami Herald and The Louisville Courier-Journal. He also was on the University of Missouri School of Journalism faculty for six years, and he has written two books, most recently “The Girl with the Agate Eyes: The Untold Story of Mattie Howard, Kansas City’s Queen of the Underworld.”
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