Historical Performance at the Museum

By Karin Brookes

In Historical Performance, we think that the music we perform is rather—well—historic, but the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s “date nights” on Friday and Saturday evenings use 5,000 years of art as a selling point. HP students will represent just a fraction of those five millennia when they provide entertainment at the Met’s Date Nights on May 10 and 11.

After taking a private guided tour of the recently reinstalled European painting galleries, 20 students designed programs based on what inspired them throughout the museum. They will present three concerts each evening between 6 and 8pm, each of the six with different performers and repertoire, and all in the Petrie Court Café.

Juilliard Historical Performance students are no strangers to giving concerts at the Met. Juilliard415 has performed with the early music legend Jordi Savall at the Met on several occasions, and, in 2019, small HP ensembles performed in galleries throughout the museum.

For the current cohort, however, these performances will be a first, though the whole department has made three visits to the museum over the last 18 months, to the Tudors exhibition, the Musical Instrument collection, and the European painting galleries and period rooms in the Wrightsman Galleries.

Bring your date and join us as we celebrate concert projects that reflect art at the Met!

Karin Brookes is the administrative director of the Historical Performance program

HP at the Met
May 10 and 11
Petrie Court Café, Metropolitan Museum of Art
metmuseum.org/events/programs/met-live-arts/date-night