As 2019 makes its way from winter to the first hints of spring, Kent's season brings a massive early Sibelius work, and then the following week, an intimate choral program featuring a world premiere.

Sibelius's Kullervo has been called "the King Kong of orchestral composition," so grand is it in scope and ambition. On Monday, February 25, Kent leads the Oratorio Society of New York in this rarely-performed symphonic poem dramatizing a story from Kalevala, Finland's national epic, with Finnish soprano Johanna Rusanen making her Carnegie Hall debut with what is a signature role for her, and Takaoki Onishi, baritone, as well as tenors and basses of the Oratorio Society of New York and of the Manhattan School of Music Symphonic Chorus. Kent conducts Kullervo and Debussy's "Sirènes," which showcases the women of the OSNY, and OSNY Associate Conductor David Rosenmeyer conducts Berlioz's "La mort d'Ophélie," also scored for women's chorus.

In Musica Sacra's spring program on Tuesday, March 5, the Renaissance interleaves with the present, as the sections of William Byrd's exquisite Mass for Five Voices alternate with works by Orlando Gibbons and Thomas Tallis and the contemporary John Tavener and Stephen Paulus, all of which will sound especially otherworldly underneath the Gothic arches of St. John the Divine. The program is also highlighted by the world premiere of Michael Gilbertson's Migration for choir and cello - Arthur Fiacco is the soloist - setting poetry of Kai Hoffman-Krull.

The Manhattan School of Music marks its centennial this year, and on Wednesday, February 27, Kent leads off a program by the Manhattan School of Music Women's Chorus with Brahms's Vier Gesänge; the concert is also conducted by Ronnie Oliver and MSM graduate conductors, and it takes place in MSM's newly-renovated Neidorff-Karpati Hall. And for organ fans: Kent visits churches in Sarasota, FL ( March 8), and Ridgefield, CT ( March 22), for organ recitals.

Summer singers note! The Amherst Early Music Festival Choral Workshop is accepting applications now - July 14-21 in New London, CT, digging into Monteverdi and Carissimi.

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