Noteworthy

“When I first encountered the incredible musicians of the Toronto Symphony Orchestra,” says TSO Music Director Gustavo Gimeno, “they were all so eager to welcome me—both to their home city and to Roy Thomson Hall. Now, at long last, it’s my turn to welcome them to my various homes away from Toronto, in many important European cities and venues.”

Midway through its 2025/26 season—one defined by international  artistic explorations—your TSO will proudly bring Canadian music and music-making to Western Europe as part of a 14-day tour spanning no fewer than eight cities in six countries. Running from January 27 to February 9, 2026, the Spain & Europe Tour celebrates the power of music to transcend national boundaries. It will also be Gimeno’s first intercontinental tour with the orchestra—one of great personal significance.

Eight Historic Cities & Concert Halls

The first leg fittingly comprises an extended visit to Gimeno’s homeland of Spain—marking the first time the TSO has ever travelled there—beginning in the capital city of Madrid. The orchestra will perform two different programs over two nights at the Auditorio Nacional de Música (Jan 27 and 28), which is just a few kilometres away from the Teatro Real, where Gimeno will be in his first season as Music Director. From there, the TSO will travel to Zaragoza, a nexus of history and architecture, to appear in one of Spain’s most impressive halls, the Auditorio—Palacio de Congresos de Zaragoza (Jan 29). The Spanish portion of the tour then concludes in the cultural hub of Barcelona with a performance at the beautiful Palau de la Música Catalana (Jan 30), a UNESCO World Heritage Site. 

After a brief pause, the second leg of the tour commences with the orchestra’s first-ever performance in Luxembourg, at the Philharmonie Luxembourg (Feb 2)—home of Orchestre Philharmonique du Luxembourg where Gimeno will have recently concluded his decade-long tenure as Music Director. The next day, the TSO will visit the Netherlands, with a return to Amsterdam—Gimeno’s home base—and the legendary stage of The Concertgebouw (Feb 3), which is well known to Gimeno who began his musical journey as a percussionist with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in 2001. “I am excited to play guest and host at the same time,” he says.

Hamburg is the next stop, and though the orchestra has toured to Germany’s second-largest city before, this marks the TSO’s début at the famed Elbphilharmonie (Feb 5), a marvel of modern design. From there, the orchestra heads to the charming, chocolate-lover’s paradise of Antwerp, Belgium, and its vibrant De Singel arts centre (Feb 6) before bringing the tour to a triumphant close with an appearance in “The City of Music” itself, Vienna, Austria, at the stunning Wiener Konzerthaus (Feb 9).

Nine Classic & Contemporary Works

For such an expansive tour, Gimeno has selected a similarly far-reaching repertoire that characteristically juxtaposes contemporary creations with time-honoured favourites. In total, the TSO will present nine pieces split across multiple programs in different combinations.

Four major orchestral works will be featured: The enormously popular Piano Concerto No. 2 by Sergei Rachmaninoff exudes both warmth and melancholy, painted in lush orchestral colours, and features a truly virtuosic solo part. Sergei Prokofiev’s Symphony No. 5, which the composer called “a hymn to free and happy Man, to his mighty powers, his pure and noble spirit,” is a soul-filling work that captures a broad spectrum of emotion. One of the greatest violin concertos of the 20th Century, Béla Bartók’s Violin Concerto No. 1 masterfully incorporates elements of folk music from the composer’s native Hungary. And Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 4 presents a transcendent vision of heaven as seen through the eyes of a child. “Compared to Mahler’s other symphonies, there is something smaller and more intimate about the Fourth—it’s like a jewel,” says Gimeno. “Whether you are performing the work or listening to it, the experience is simply sublime.”

These pieces stand alongside recent compositions by two Canadian composers: Kelly-Marie Murphy’s TSO-commissioned Curiosity, Genius, and the Search for Petula Clark—which is on the orchestra’s award-winning first recording for Harmonia Mundi (Messiaen: Turangalîla-Symphonie) and will be performed in every country—captures the spirit of a Glenn Gould radio documentary about the titular ’60s pop star. Rufus Wainwright’s “A Woman’s Face (Sonnet 20)”, part of a larger composition called Five Shakespeare Sonnets, is a musical interpretation of one of the Bard’s most beloved poems. And rounding out the programs is Joseph Haydn’s Scena di Berenice, a Classical cantata and impressive showcase for soprano.

Four Renowned Guest Artists

An international array of acclaimed guest artists will join Gimeno and the orchestra for portions of the tour: Austrian-British soprano Anna Prohaska, a current TSO Spotlight Artist, will lend her stunning vocals to the works by Mahler, Wainwright, and Haydn over three performances in Spain and Vienna, while German soprano Christina Landshamer sings the Mahler in Amsterdam and Hamburg. Canadian pianist and 2025/26 TSO Spotlight Artist Bruce Liu will perform the Rachmaninoff concerto at three performances in Spain, and Moldovan-Austrian-Swiss violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja will make her TSO début by lending her talents to the Bartók concerto at all five performances on the second leg of the tour.

A Singular Touring Legacy

The TSO’s touring history extends back nearly 90 years—to January 1937, when the 15-year-old orchestra performed in Detroit under the baton of the great Igor Stravinsky. Since then, the TSO has completed 80 tours on four continents, with the most notable including a 1978 visit to China under Sir Andrew Davis—where the TSO was the first North American orchestra permitted to enter the country following the Cultural Revolution—an appearance at Expo 67 under Seiji Ozawa; the 1990 Pacific Rim Tour under Günther Herbig, with stops in Canada, the US, Australia, Singapore, Taiwan, and Japan; and the 1987 Canadian Odyssey Tour under Sir Andrew that took TSO musicians to 15 cities in Central, Western, and Northern Canada. 

However, outside North America, Europe has been the orchestra’s most frequented destination: The TSO’s first European tour—to Britain and France—took place in 1965 under Ozawa, and the 2026 Spain & Europe Tour will mark the orchestra’s ninth visit to the continent. “This tour will be the longest the orchestra and I have ever travelled together,” notes Gimeno, “so it provides us with an extended occasion to grow even closer, socially, emotionally, and artistically. When we work together with a common purpose and toward a common goal, the music-making just becomes deeper.” 

“So there’s no better time to show the world who we are and what we do.” 

The TSO’s many supporters make this tour possible, and as a show of appreciation to Toronto audiences, Gimeno and the orchestra will perform a tour preview and kick-off concert—Bruce Liu Plays Rachmaninoff—on January 22 and 23, 2026, at Roy Thomson Hall. 

For complete city-by-city programming details and up-to-date ticketing information, please visit TSO.CA/Tour.