Jessie Montgomery, Mead Composer-in-Residence, takes a bow during a CSO MusicNOW concert. Photo by Todd Rosenberg Photography.
In Wednesday’s (6/11) Chicago Classical Review, Lawrence A. Johnson writes, “The Chicago Symphony Orchestra has informed subscribers that its … long-running MusicNOW … contemporary music series will be ‘paused’ for the 2025-26 season…. The CSO series presented just two MusicNOW concerts this current season, most recently in March. With the expiration of Jessie Montgomery’s term last June, the CSO is currently without a composer in residence for the first time in nearly four decades. In an emailed statement from the CSO press office, Cristina Rocca, CSO vice-president for artistic planning, said ‘The CSO MusicNOW series will be paused in 2025/26 to take time to imagine new possibilities for connecting Chicago audiences with new music…. Conversations with the artistic planning team and Zell Music Director Designate Klaus Mäkelä are underway to guide future plans … Subscribers … are invited to return to Symphony Center to explore concerts across the 2025/26 Season that feature works by living composers.’ MusicNOW was inaugurated in the 1998-99 season, early in Augusta Read Thomas’s tenure as CSO composer in residence…. MusicNOW offered … music by living composers for chamber groupings and smaller orchestral ensembles.”
