Before joining us in Montréal and Québec City, the guest artists are experiencing a particularly busy season starting in the summer of 2026: tours at the biggest European festivals, recordings, new creations, duo debuts. A tour d’horizon, artist by artist, of what’s happening.
John Butt and the Dunedin Consort
Scottish harpsichordist and conductor John Butt, Music Director of the Dunedin Consort, is invited to the chamber music festival Music at Paxton; in August, John Butt conducts his ensemble as part of the prestigious Edinburgh International Festival.
At the same time, John Butt serves in 2026 as Artistic Director of the Baroque Music Festival of the Institut français d’Écosse.
Hayoung Choi
South Korean cellist Hayoung Choi, First Prize winner at the 2022 Queen Elisabeth Competition, will take on one of the pinnacles of any cellist’s career by performing all six of Bach’s Suites for Solo Cello in a single evening at the Edinburgh International Festival (August 2026). The 2026–2027 season will see her as soloist with the Victoria Symphony Orchestra in Haydn’s Cello Concerto No. 1.
Vox Luminis and Lionel Meunier
Belgian ensemble Vox Luminis, led by its founder Lionel Meunier, makes a splash at the Festival de Saintes (Domenico Scarlatti’s Stabat Mater, July 16) and then at the Salzburg Festival: the *Mass in B minor* and a programme pairing Liszt’s *Via Crucis* with Biber’s Rosary Sonatas.
Daniel Lanthier and Marco Baronchelli
Originally from Montréal, Daniel Lanthier has been teaching baroque oboe at the Utrecht Conservatory since 2020 and performs regularly with Les Musiciens du Louvre, the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, Concerto Copenhagen, and Il Giardino Armonico.
Marco Baronchelli, trained under Luca Pianca in Lugano, is a member of the Italian ensemble filoBarocco, which is part of the European EEEMERGING+ programme. The duo they present in Montréal is part of a chamber tour built in the spirit of their recent projects.
Augustin Hadelich
American violinist Augustin Hadelich is completing his artist residency with the Boston Symphony Orchestra, a distinction reserved for the most prominent soloists. He plays the 1744 Guarneri del Gesù “Leduc-Szeryng,” made available to him by the Tarisio Trust.
Ensemble Jupiter, Léa Desandre and Thomas Dunford
For Ensemble Jupiter, led by lutenist Thomas Dunford and mezzo-soprano Léa Desandre, 2026 is the year of the major promotional tour for their new album Songs of Passion, a double CD released on Erato in late 2025 and winner of the Presto Recording of the Year. The tour culminates in November at Carnegie Hall (New York, November 17, 2026) and in Montréal. Léa Desandre, now one of the most sought-after operatic artists of her generation (Erato, Victoires de la Musique), simultaneously carries on a busy 2026 season marked by productions at the Paris Opera, the Festival d’Aix-en-Provence, and Salzburg.
Les Boréades
Founded in 1991 by recorder player Francis Colpron, the Montréal ensemble Les Boréades is preparing its 2026–2027 season, built around its 30th anniversary, the centrepiece of which will be a production of Lully’s opera Atys.
Sir András Schiff
The Hungarian-British pianist — knighted in 2014 — has made The Art of Fugue the centrepiece of his 2025–2026 season. Artist-in-Residence at the Pierre Boulez Saal in Berlin, he continues a cycle titled “The World of Bach” combining lectures and performances of The Art of Fugue. The international press has also reported on a recording project of the work currently in progress; Montréal will be, in late November, one of the major North American stops on this Bachian journey.
Andrew Wan, Anna Burden and Victor Fournelle-Blain
Concertmaster of the OSM since 2008 and founder of the New Orford String Quartet, Andrew Wan also maintains a residency at Cecilia Concerts in Halifax. Together with Anna Burden and Victor Fournelle-Blain — two OSM soloists from the new generation that defines Montréal’s orchestral excellence — he forms an entirely Québécois trio for this Bachian highlight.
Ensemble Correspondances and Sébastien Daucé
For Sébastien Daucé, 2026 is the year of two major undertakings. The first: a new recording of Cavalli’s La Calisto for Harmonia Mundi (digital release 2026). The second, which is precisely the programme for Montréal: a cycle of Bach’s “Weimar Cantatas” presented throughout the year — Festival de Saintes (July 12), Promenades musicales du Pays d’Auge (August 1), Académie Bach de Saint-Donat (August 22), Théâtre de Caen (November 10) — just before the ensemble arrives in Montréal.
Chris Thile
For American mandolinist Chris Thile, 2026 is the year of the concert rollout of his major recording project: Bach: Sonatas and Partitas, Vol. 2, a double album released on Nonesuch Records, which transcribes Bach’s Sonatas and Partitas for Solo Violin for solo mandolin. A MacArthur Fellow, founder of Nickel Creek and the Punch Brothers, Chris Thile thus continues a rare dialogue between Bach and the American bluegrass tradition.
Pavel Kolesnikov and Samson Tsoy
For Pavel Kolesnikov and Samson Tsoy — partners on stage and in life — 2026 is the season of their world debut as an official duo: Edinburgh International Festival, Klavier-Festival Ruhr, Piano à Lyon, Wigmore Hall. Their previous albums (Harmonia Mundi), including their 2024 Schubert recording (Diapason d’Or), have been celebrated by critics. A third album is expected in 2026.
Akademie für Alte Musik Berlin (AKAMUS)
Orchestra-in-Residence at the Konzerthaus Berlin, AKAMUS continues in 2026 to enrich its reference discography on Harmonia Mundi and other labels. The ensemble carries on its “Europe Dances” cycle across Europe and shines throughout the 2026 season with its immense companionship with the music of the Bach family.
Kent Nagano
Now Conductor Emeritus of the OSM, the maestro is in 2026 at the heart of a world-scale Wagnerian project: “The Wagner Cycles,” a re-reading of the Ring on period instruments with the Dresden Festival Orchestra and Concerto Köln, reaching its apex in 2026 at the Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg and the Cologne Philharmonie, with Götterdämmerung as the crowning moment. His return to the OSM for Bach reflects, after twenty years of attachment to the Québec metropolis, a loyalty to the Cantor of Leipzig that has become his hallmark.
Twenty years after its first concerts, the Festival International Bach Montréal approaches its anniversary edition surrounded by artists at the heart of the international scene in 2026 — summer tours devoted to Monteverdi’s Vespro, Bach’s Mass in B minor,The Art of Fugue, and the Weimar Cantatas; recordings, duo debuts, Wagnerian projects. It is this entire living ecosystem that comes to Montréal and Québec City from November 14 to December 6, to celebrate these first twenty years.
