Carnegie Hall

Orchestra of St. Luke’s (OSL) is the iconic New York ensemble, called the city’s “hometown band” (The New York Times). It has appeared hundreds of times at Carnegie Hall, performing a remarkable range of music from Baroque to Broadway, with stellar guest artists and brilliant conductors. It’s always fun to learn something new about a good friend, so here are five facts about Orchestra of St. Luke’s.

No. 1: An Orchestra Is Born

Have you wondered why it’s called “Orchestra of St. Luke’s”? If you’re familiar with the city’s West Village, you probably can make a good guess. OSL’s roots were planted when a group of virtuoso musicians performed chamber music concerts at the Church of St. Luke in the Fields on Hudson Street in 1974.

No. 2: Carnegie Hall Debut

OSL made its Carnegie Hall debut in 1983 with the Vienna Boys Choir, but its first Carnegie Hall–presented concert was on November 25, 1984, performing Handel’s opera Orlando, with revered mezzo-soprano Marilyn Horne singing the title role and Charles Mackerras on the podium. It was the first performance in a three-concert Handel opera festival. That festival, and a Bach choral celebration the following year, helped establish OSL’s reputation as one of the preeminent modern-instrument orchestras interpreting Baroque music.

No. 3: Notable Conductors

Bernard Labadie's  2018 appointment as OSL’s principal conductor continued the outstanding lineage of great artists on the podium. Labadie is an internationally celebrated expert in 18th-century music and one in a long line of conductors who have explored the Baroque and Classical eras’ beautiful music at the Hall, including Raymond Leppard, Trevor Pinnock, and Christopher Hogwood.

But OSL’s range of repertoire extends far beyond the Baroque. Over the years, the orchestra has taken Carnegie Hall audiences on fascinating journeys through choral music, opera, contemporary works, film scores, and Broadway classics. Such baton luminaries as Robert Shaw, André Previn, Michael Tilson Thomas, Roger Norrington, John Adams, David Robertson, and many others have led the orchestra in numerous critically acclaimed performances.

No. 4: Longevity

Carnegie Hall first presented an OSL concert series during the 1986–1987 season. The series went on hiatus in 1988, but returned in the 1994–1995 season. It has been a mainstay ever since and is one of the longest-running regularly presented series at the Hall.

No. 5: Surprising Appearances

In addition to the remarkable performances that make its series so exciting, OSL has been the orchestra for some of the Hall’s most memorable benefits, galas, and multimedia events. In a 2002 benefit performance for the Hall, Audra McDonald and Hugh Jackman led a starry cast in Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Carousel in concert. There was more from the iconic Broadway composers in 2005 with Reba McIntire, Brian Stokes Mitchell, and Alec Baldwin in a benefit performance of South Pacific, one of the Hall’s most enchanting evenings. Ask Your Mama! (2009), The Sound of Music (2012), Guys and Dolls (2014), An Evening with Sting: Symphonicities (2015), and Candide (2018) all featured sensational singing actors and OSL’s virtuosity.

Decked out like NASA engineers—including white shirts, black ties, and pocket protectors—OSL performed music from Richard Strauss to David Bowie in We Chose to Go to the Moon. This special multimedia performance, curated by historian and collector John Monsky, commemorated the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 moon landing.

Photography: Orchestra of St. Luke’s (Stern Auditorium / Perelman Stage) by Richard Termine; Church of St. Luke in the Fields by Beyond My Ken; Stern and Horne by Steve J. Sherman; Labadie by Dario Acosta; Tilson Thomas by Art Streiber; Adams by Chris Lee; McIntire and Baldwin by Chris Lee; Appleby, Lithgow, and Morley by Chris Lee; Grigsby, Gooden, and Orchestra of St. Luke’s by Fadi Kheir; concert memorabilia courtesy of the Carnegie Hall Rose Archives.