The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum Announces Thursday Night Music

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Press contact: Christina Jensen, Jensen Artists
646 536 7864 x 1 | christina@jensenartists.com 

BOSTON, MA – The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum announces a bold new concert series, Thursday Night Music, curated by Abrams Curator of Music George Steel and held on select Thursday evenings. Thursday Night Music brings a different energy to the concert hall than the afternoon performances of the Museum’s Weekend Concert Series, featuring edgier, more experimental work. With no intermissions, open seating, and a relaxed atmosphere, these single-set performances offer immersive and adventurous listening experiences. All concerts will take place in the Museum’s extraordinary Calderwood Hall—a 300-seat “sonic cube” with three levels of balconies designed so that 80% of seats are front row, creating a uniquely intimate and intense acoustic environment.

The inaugural Thursday Night Music concert on February 26, 2026 features Steve Reich’s Music for 18 Musicians performed by Ensemble Signal conducted by Co-Artistic Director Brad Lubman. This is likely the first time that this landmark minimalist work will be performed by a professional ensemble in Boston. Reich, a music pioneer and living legend, celebrates his 90th birthday in 2026. He has been called “the most original musical thinker of our time” (The New Yorker) and “among the great composers of the century” (The New York Times).

Massively ambitious, the hour-long Music for 18 Musicians features four grand pianos, three full-size marimbas, two xylophones, three singers, clarinet, violin, and cello. In this work, Reich drew influences from a wide variety of sources including Balinese gamelan, plainchant, and jazz. It premiered 50 years ago in 1976 and continues to loom large in today’s musical landscape.

The 1998 recording of Music for 18 Musicians on Nonesuch won a GRAMMY Award, and David Bowie named it among his 25 favorite vinyl albums. Ensemble Signal recorded the piece for Harmonia Mundi in 2015. Their album was praised by Reich himself who said, “Signal has made an extraordinary recording of Music for 18 Musicians. Fast moving, spot on and emotionally charged. Take a listen.” The New York Times raved, “Ensemble Signal joyously melds rhythmic precision and transparency of sound with a startling ability to shade colors. It’s like hearing a ritual unfold and made radical once more.”

“Music for 18 Musicians may be the most influential piece of American music written in the last half century, and we’re thrilled to present what is likely its first professional ensemble performance in Boston,” George Steel says. “Bringing Ensemble Signal to the Gardner to perform this hour-long masterwork as we celebrate Steve Reich’s 90th birthday feels like the epitome of what Thursday Night Music is all about: bold, immersive, and unforgettable.”

Ensemble Signal was founded by Co-Artistic/Executive Director Lauren Radnofsky and Co-Artistic Director/Conductor Brad Lubman in 2008. Described by The New York Times as “one of the most vital groups of its kind,” Signal regularly performs with Lubman and features a supergroup of independent artists from the modern music scene. The ensemble has appeared at concert halls and international festivals including Lincoln Center Festival, the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Series at Walt Disney Concert Hall, BIG EARS Festival, Carnegie Hall's Zankel Hall, Lincoln Center, Washington Performing Arts, Cal Performances, Tanglewood Music Festival, Ojai Music Festival, the Guggenheim Museum (NY), NPR Tiny Desk Concerts, and the Bang on a Can Marathon. 

Photo by Stephanie Berger 

Tickets for Music for 18 Musicians on February 26, 2026 will be released in waves on January 8, January 29, and February 12. 

Tickets are available at gardnermuseum.org/about/music or by calling the Box Office at 617 278 5156. For additional information including about accessibility, please contact boxoffice@isgm.org.

Performances take place in Calderwood Hall at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum (25 Evans Way, Boston, MA).

The next Thursday Night Music concert will take place on May 28, 2026 and will be announced in early April, with the series continuing in the fall.