Opera Italiana Is in the Air will return to Central Park’s Naumburg Bandshell on Sept. 21, 2026, for its ninth annual concert, “Harmonies of Peace,” presented on the International Day of Peace.

Founder and Music Director Alvise Casellati, Artistic Director of Teatro Massimo di Palermo, will lead the free outdoor performance, which will feature soprano Daniela Machado and tenor Alessio Borraggine alongside musicians from the Metropolitan Opera Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic, The Juilliard School and Manhattan School of Music.

The program will include Rossini overtures, selections from Puccini’s “La Bohème,” excerpts from “Turandot,” and the world premiere of “everwander,” an orchestral work by Juilliard Pre-College composer Ethan Hsu. The Weill Cornell Music and Medicine Chorus will open the concert with the U.S. and Italian national anthems.

Casellati founded Opera Italiana Is in the Air in 2017 following a conversation with philanthropist Daniele Bodini, Chairman of the FIAC Foundation. He made his Italian conducting debut at Teatro La Fenice in 2011 following a career as a New York attorney and studies at Columbia Law School and The Juilliard School.