Patrick Galvin and Jennifer Hou will present 5–6 performances of Dear Camilla, a violin and piano program interwoven with an original epistolary narrative honoring Galvin’s former teacher and legendary violinist Camilla Wicks. Performances take place across the Bay Area in January and February 2027.

Sumi Lee will create Seoul to Buenos Aires, a new, contemporary tango recording that blends Korean musical influences with Argentine tango. Composed in fall 2026, the project will be recorded in the San Francisco Bay Area in early spring 2027 & premiered in live performances at Bay Area venues and festivals in late spring 2027.

ZHENIIA, a Persian jazz fusion ensemble led by San Francisco composer and bassist Leela Paymai, will record Darya, a new album in which each composition is built around a different Persian dastgah, drawing on the Iranian diaspora experience of separation, memory, and resilience. Recording takes place in Oakland, fall 2026.

Violinist and composer Thea Farhadian will present Obsidian Lines in December 2027, a meditative, microtonal electroacoustic work of striking harmonic depth that integrates elements of Western classical, Arabic classical, and Armenian folk traditions.

Kev Choice will lead and present Legacy Symphonic, a 20–25 piece ensemble presenting diverse, contemporary repertoire rooted in the music of the Black diaspora, spanning Hip-Hop, Jazz, and classical traditions. The project centers Black and underserved communities, expanding diversity and representation within orchestral spaces.

Faye Carol & Her Octet will record ‘The Funky Latin Getdown,’ an ambitious suite of music blending jazz, blues, funk, and Latin music, to be released on her Getdown Records. 

Anne Sajdera will record nine new jazz works, scored for different configurations of a jazz quintet, 9-piece string ensemble, string quartet, and solo piano. The project will be recorded at SFCM’s recording facility and Opus Studios in 2027, with a corresponding album release concert in San Francisco.

The San Francisco Electronic Music Festival will celebrate its 25th anniversary with the presentation of two special one-night programs at San Francisco Public Library on August 11 and at Gray Area’s Grand Theater August 22, and its customary 3-night festival at The Lab September 24-26, 2026.

Som Dela (Irene Sazer, violin; Jane Lenoir, flute; Rebecca Hass, piano; Michaelle Goerlitz, percussion) will complete and release their debut professional studio recording, featuring Brazilian music written by women (historical and living composers) and members of the band, to be presented at a concert in fall 2027.

The Sampaguitas will release a new album entitled Heels Upon the Ground, encompassing folk music from the Philippines and original music inspired by the Fil-Am diaspora. The Sampaguitas explore the genre of Filipina folk through three-part vocal harmonies and the collective sharing of our “third culture” stories.

The Earhart Trio will professionally record two commissioned works of contemporary art music: Spiral Arm for piano trio by Ben Dorfan, and two movements of Piano Trio No. 2 by Lera Auerbach, on July 5/6, 2026 at Berkeley Piano Club with recording engineer Samantha Bounkeua.

Strobe will commission composer Jean Ahn to create a new ragtime-inspired work based on San Francisco landmarks. The piece will be premiered alongside Golden Gate Rag and Bay Bridge Rag as part of a curated program presented across Bay Area venues in the 2026–27 season.

Vitamin Em will celebrate their 10th-year anniversary by presenting a special recorded concert event this Fall at Berkeley’s beautiful Hillside Club, the site of their very first concert 10 years ago. The concert will include new works across many genres celebrating this milestone in a joyful atmosphere open to all ages.

Mat Muntz will create Phantom Islands II: The Bag of Winds, a composition combining traditional Croatian and Bulgarian bagpipes with contemporary improvisation and chamber music, channeling Mediterranean maritime mythology, Jack Vance’s post-apocalyptic surrealism, demonological readings of Herman Melville, and Ornette Coleman’s Skies of America.

Bululú will produce and premiere DOMÉSTICO, an all-original Latin music album inspired by the everyday lives of Latinx communities in the San Francisco Bay Area. Blending traditional Latin American genres with contemporary global production, it explores immigration, LGBTQ+ identity, women’s rights, spirituality, domestic life, and cultural empowerment.

Composer/trumpeter Sarah Wilson will write 5-6 compositions for her new jazz ensemble, Fuse Quintet, featuring herself (trumpet), Kasey Knudsen (alto sax), John Schott (guitar), Tony Scherr (bass) and Kenny Wollesen (drums). The Back Room in Berkeley will premiere the new music followed by a recording in late fall 2026.

Composer and producer David Steinberg will record Tunes From Our Backyard, a project created to reimagine songs from the WPA California Folk Music Project, a New Deal-era folk music survey conducted by Sidney Robertson Cowell. Funding will go towards the project’s first studio recording to be completed in 2026.

Circadian String Quartet with guest singer, Melinda Martinez Becker, and others will premiere the five act Chamber Opera, Eurydice’s Defiance, composed by David Ryther with a libretto by Kimiko Guthrie in April of 2027 at Cal State East Bay Hayward, with a repeat performance in San Francisco in May.

The Simple Excesses Quartet, led by composer-pianist Motoko Honda with Cory Wright, Jordan Glenn, and Matt Small, will create a modern chamber jazz album through rehearsals, studio recording, and production (Oakland, Aug 2026–Sept 2027), culminating in a public album release performance in Fall 2027 (Oakland).

In May 2027, Earplay will present Voicings, a program celebrating the human voice. Featuring multiple vocal works, the performance includes a new collaboration between composer Josiah Catalan and poet Brandon Gagante. Earplay’s 2027 season, entitled Carbon-Based, is a broad musical reflection upon the new age of artificial intelligence.

Nippon Kobo Vol. 3: Tradition × Evolution will present a world premiere by Ken Ueno for a Japanese traditional instrument and two open instruments TBA in San Francisco in April 2027. The project brings together a leading Japanese instrumentalist from Japan and Bay Area musicians to explore new possibilities for traditional instruments in contemporary chamber music.

Melody of China will present its “Legacy Concert (1993-2027)” featuring Melody of China artists, and guests, to celebrate the ensemble’s accomplishments, its many cross-cultural collaborations over the years, as well as the Bay Area arts community that has supported new and traditional Chinese music for 34 years.

Edward Schocker will compose Epiphanic, a multimedia community-driven work with members of Sacred and Profane Choir and Thingamajigs Performance Group. The project incorporates community storytelling; live projected images combined with electro-acoustic instruments and an ensemble of vocalists. Events will take place in Alameda, Contra Costa and San Francisco counties.

The Second Annual Ben Goldberg Festival of Music will be held October 1–3, 2026, at Wyldflowr Arts in Oakland, and on October 4 at Bird & Beckett in San Francisco. The festival will spotlight two bands and a solo set each night, featuring Things That Move, Invisible Guy, Archimedes Lullaby, Trouble Trouble, Flower-Radish, and Ben Goldberg’s Brainchild.