15th Anniversary Season

Our 15th anniversary season offers baroque masterpieces featuring an impressive roster of internationally renowned performers in their Haymarket debuts, as well as the returns of critically acclaimed and award-winning favorites. We hope you will mark your calendar to join Haymarket in 2025 for an expansive season that celebrates Haymarket's 15th anniversary, and promises more “creatively staged, beautifully sung, and superbly played performances” (Opera News).

The season opens with an unknown curiosity and the Chicago premiere of Alessandro Stradella’s oratorio Ester, to be presented on March 28th in the Gannon Concert Hall at DePaul University's Holtschneider Performance Center. A captivating tale of courage, faith, and redemption–Stradella’s Ester will sweep you away with its dramatic music and riveting tale of danger and bravery.

The season continues on May 1st when we return to the Arts Club of Chicago for The Early Opera Cabaret. This annual celebration has become a favorite of many Chicago music lovers’ calendars, offering tantalizing peeks into upcoming Haymarket productions plus arias chosen and performed by stars of our 2025 season. 

In June, we will present a fully-staged production of Leonardo Vinci’s operatic tour de force Artaserse, set to become Haymarket’s second recording with Chicago’s Grammy Award-winning label Cedille Records. This landmark event offers audiences the rare opportunity to experience Vinci’s gripping 18th-century masterpiece in its full dramatic splendor. Set to a libretto by the illustrious Pietro Metastasio, Artaserse is a work of striking emotional depth and virtuosic brilliance. Haymarket revives this Baroque gem that premiered in Rome in 1730 to great acclaim, with its trademark unwavering commitment to historical performance. Haymarket’s production features a sensational cast, a colorful orchestra of period instruments, and sets and costumes to evoke ancient Persia. Performances will be held on June 27th, 29th, and July 1st in the Jarvis Opera Hall at DePaul University’s Holtschneider Performance Center. 

In a summer highlight, Haymarket has been invited to debut at Chicago’s prestigious Ravinia Music Festival, presenting a concert of George Frideric Handel’s magic opera Alcina on August 24th at the historic Martin Theatre. With a cast of exceptional singers, headlined by soprano Nicole Cabell, and Haymarket’s acclaimed  period-instrument orchestra, the performance aims to enchant audiences with its blend of musical precision and theatrical flair. This highly anticipated debut sets the stage for a dazzling evening of sorcery, deception, and transcendent artistry.

Marking a thrilling new collaboration, Haymarket and The Newberry Consort will co-produce a concert of the oldest surviving opera, Jacopo Peri’s Euridice. The concerts will be held October 24th and 25th, in Chicago at the Art Institute of Chicago and in Evanston at the Music Institute of Chicago. The concert presentation will feature a cast of celebrated artists both familiar and new to Newberry and Haymarket audiences, and an orchestra of expert period instrumentalists assembled from within Chicago’s flourishing early music scene and beyond.

2025 Season