WE THE DREAMERS
The Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music presents its 64th season, We the Dreamers, running July 26 through August 9, 2026. Framed by the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence, this transformative season asks one of the most resonant civic questions of our time: Who is the “we” of America—and who are “we” still becoming? The answers unfold across four world premiere Festival Commissions, eight West Coast premieres, and two U.S. premieres, brought to life by a dynamic global roster of over 20 composers and an extraordinary array of guest artists.
Highlights include the second-ever performance and West Coast premiere of Philip Glass’s Symphony No. 15 Lincoln, which draws on Lincoln’s urgent reverence for the Constitution and his prescient warnings against internal division, alongside an appearance by Former U.S. Poet Laureate Rita Dove and new works by Clarice Assad, Vivian Fung, Sarah Hennies, and Pedro Emanuel Pereira—together offering a compelling portrait of our contemporary moment through the lens of history, civic reckoning, and global perspective.
"We the Dreamers is both an invitation and a responsibility"; says Music Director Cristian Măcelaru. "At this historic moment, we are asking how music can help us imagine a more expansive 'we'—one that listens deeply, embraces complexity, and dares to hope. These works remind us that dreaming is essential to shaping a more just and connected future."
This year’s composers in residence are Vivian Fung, Pedro Emanuel Pereira, Leilehua Lanzilotti, James Lee III, Sarah Hennies, Clarice Assad, Jackson A. Waters, Dan Dediu, Eunike Tanzil, Sean Shepherd, Gala Flagello, Lisa Bielawa, and Paul Dooley. Also on the program: Hannah Ishizaki, and Elena Kats-Chernin. Guest artists include baritone Zachary James, clarinetist Carlos Ferreira, pianist Alexandra Dariescu, violinists Philippe Quint and Tessa Lark, and poet Rita Dove. Spanning four programmatic themes—American Culture, Identity & Experience; American History; American Voices; and Music for Here and Now—the season reflects a plurality of lived experiences, aesthetics, and cultural perspectives. As always, composers are present throughout the Festival, engaging directly with musicians and audiences and making the creative process immediate, human, and alive.
2026 SEASON CONCERTS & EVENTS
6:30PM • PRE-CONCERT PICNIC + TALK: A free outdoor pre-concert experience featuring a brass sextet and a special welcome by Music Director Cristian Măcelaru. Bring takeout or some snacks from home. Table seating available.
The 64th season kicks off with Music Director Cristian Măcelaru leading the Festival Orchestra and audience in a powerful meditation on the distance between national ideals and lived reality.
Vivian Fung‘s Festival Commission (world premiere) opens the season with a work responding to the U.S. National Anthem through the lens of her intersectional identity as a dual Canadian-American citizen with Chinese familial lineage. The piece confronts the tension between patriotic tradition and the deeply imperfect struggle to uphold democratic values for all.
Pedro Emanuel Pereira‘s Clarinet Concerto (Festival Commission, world premiere), featuring clarinetist Carlos Ferreira, blends Portuguese musical traditions with experimental timbres and performative innovation, reimagining virtuosity for the present moment.
The program concludes with Philip Glass‘s Symphony No. 15 Lincoln (West Coast premiere)—featuring GRAMMY® award winning baritone Zachary James—is a six-movement symphony incorporating Abraham Lincoln’s own words, including the Emancipation Proclamation and reflections on law, power, and ambition. The work resonates forcefully with the urgencies of today.
Centering voices of resistance and cultural continuity, this program explores the act of dreaming as a form of defiance.
Leilehua Lanzilotti‘s of light and stone (West Coast premiere) draws on the legacy of Nā Lani ʻEhā—the “Heavenly Four” of Hawaiian royalty—to honor Indigenous Hawaiian identity, gathering, and the enduring power of cultural lineage.
James Lee III‘s Shades of Unbroken Dreams (West Coast premiere), featuring pianist Alexandra Dariescu, channels the cadence and moral force of Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech, reflecting on justice, equality, and perseverance.
Sarah Hennies‘s Festival Creative Lab Commission (world premiere) will use the large-scale forces of the orchestra to evoke the complexities of human brain activity, drawing on psychological and musical studies related to existence, identity, and memory. The Creative Lab, now in its third year, empowers composers to reimagine the orchestral experience with wide curatorial latitude.
A genre-expanding program examining power, agency, and the forces that shape contemporary life.
Clarice Assad‘s Kontrol (Festival Commission, world premiere), featuring violinist Philippe Quint, is a genre-defying work for narrator, projections, violin, and orchestra that interrogates the role of technology in human autonomy.
Defending Greenwood (Movement III: June 1, 1921) (West Coast premiere) by Jackson A. Waters—winner of the 2026 Cabrillo Emerging Black Composers Prize—bears witness to the Tulsa Race Massacre, countering historical erasure through musical testimony and remembrance.
Merging the Viennese waltz with electronic dance music, Hannah Ishizaki’s Spin (West Coast premiere), evokes motion, disorientation, and suspended time. As elegant triple-meter gestures collide with pulsing, club-like rhythms, the piece blurs past and present, creating a dizzying soundscape that feels both nostalgic and uncannily immediate.
Dan Dediu‘s Concerto for Orchestra (U.S. premiere) closes the program with a virtuosic and celebratory showcase of the ensemble, dedicated to Cristian Măcelaru in recognition of their long-standing artistic collaboration.
The season concludes with a luminous program looking toward collective possibility, resilience, and belonging.
Ascending Creatures (West Coast premiere) by Festival newcomer, Eunike Tanzil, draws inspiration from the coordinated flight of birds, exploring the interplay between individuality and unity through motion and sound. Through interlocking musical lines and evolving textures, Tanzil emphasizes the power of collective movement.
Lisa Bielawa’s Pulse (West Coast premiere), featuring violinist Tessa Lark, unfolds as a driving, heartbeat-like concerto, weaving rhythmic intensity and American musical threads into a shared sense of motion and momentum. Drawing on Lark’s deep roots in Appalachian fiddle traditions, the work evokes the spirit of folk dance and storytelling, blending vernacular musical language with Bielawa’s contemporary orchestral voice.
Celebrating marriage equality with both joy and remembrance, Rainbow Promise (U.S. premiere) honors the struggle that made it possible. Composed by Elena Kats-Chernin, the piece rings with a spirit of pure celebration and joy, but not without offering reflection on the struggle that made such celebration possible.
Sean Shepherd‘s Wanderlust (West Coast premiere) closes the season with an homage to movement and belonging by “an exciting composer of the new American generation” (New York Times). A self-proclaimed “well-treated vagabond,” Shepherd composed Wanderlust as an homage to his cosmopolitan experiences across the U.S., the U.K., and Europe, representing both his paradoxical, palpable sense of rootlessness and his desire to sink roots, pulling inspiration from disparate places and searching for the idea of home.
POST-SEASON REFLECTION—following the Grand Finale
Former (1993-1995) U.S. Poet Laureate Rita Dove joins the Festival for a special closing reflection, performing original poetry honoring the life and legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. alongside Samuel Barber’s Adagio for Strings. This will be the poetry’s West Coast premiere, offering a profound coda to a season of remembering, reckoning, and imagining what comes next.
As well as the mainstage season concerts, the Festival will continue its tradition of hosting our free Family Concert, Open Rehearsals, Meet the Composers, pre-rehearsal talks, special workshops, additional performances, community partnerships and multiple free concerts spotlighting the work of emerging composers and artists.
ALL Festival Donors are invited for an intimate preseason chamber concert featuring members of the Festival Orchestra and some special guests, followed by a post-concert toast to the season.
Become a donor and support the festival HERE.
Open Rehearsals are one of the Festival’s most cherished traditions. Almost daily for two weeks, witness new music come to life as Cristi, our composers, guest artists, and the Festival Orchestra collaborate to discover and hone the sound of each new work ahead of performances. FREE in person & livestreamed online!
Schedule will be posted soon.
A concert of works performed by the Cabrillo Festival Orchestra penned by four under-30 composers and conducted by emerging conductors, all participating in the Conductors/Composers Workshop. FREE!
This year in residence are four early-career composers, Oswald Huỳnh, Kai Kubota-Enright, Paul Novak, and Zoe Verduin, participating in the Festival’s prestigious Conductors/Composers Workshop. Composers are mentored by artists in residence and will have their pieces performed by the Festival Orchestra, led by Conducting Fellows also participating in the workshop, and culminating with the “In the Works” concert. Historically, only three composers are selected, but this year marks an expansion with a fourth composer selected in partnership with Missy Mazzoli and Ellen Reid’s Luna Composition Lab supporting young female and nonbinary composers.
Led by Conductor-in-Residence Octavio Más-Arocas, the beloved free Family Concert features Paul Dooley‘s The Conductor’s Spellbook, an interactive musical adventure introducing audiences of all ages to the orchestra through playful storytelling, alongside Gala Flagello‘s vibrant fanfare Bravado. A “Tour of the Orchestra” invites curious minds of all ages to explore the instruments that bring the music to life. In a special partnership with El Sistema Santa Cruz/Pajaro Valley, select honor students will perform alongside orchestra musicians—continuing the Festival’s commitment to access, education, and mentorship.
Hear the future of new music in this free chamber concert of original works programmed, produced, performed and presented by our adventurous 16–24-year-old Youth Ensemble. FREE!
FULL SEASON SCHEDULE & MORE ANNOUNCED SOON!
Single tickets go on sale June 2, 2026
