Seattle’s classical calendar has an adventurous streak this fall, with repertory landmarks heard in distinctive contexts alongside some intriguing new works. The mix ranges from a still-provocative opera and new orchestral and chamber works to large-scale Bach and Monteverdi, and a staged program confronting forced migration and survival. Here’s what to put on your calendars.

Seattle Symphony: Opening night, Samuel Adams

Xian Zhang launches her second season as music director with some serious star power. On the all-Prokofiev opening night program, Yuja Wang joins the Seattle Symphony for the Third Piano Concerto, a work that teems with driving rhythms, sly humor and sudden turns of mood.

A month later, Conductor Emeritus Ludovic Morlot reunites with the orchestra for the local premiere of “No Such Spring,” Seattle-based Samuel Adams’ unconventional take on the concerto idea, featuring Conor Hanick at the piano, alongside spring-inspired music by Frank Bridge and Schumann.

Opening night: Sept. 19, as of this writing, limited number of tickets available from $156.50. Morlot Conducts The Sounds of Spring: Oct. 22 and 24, tickets from $48.40. Benaroya Hall, 200 University St., Seattle; seattlesymphony.org

‘Salome’ at Seattle Opera, ‘Die Walküre’ at Tacoma Opera

Richard Strauss’ “Salome” caused such a scandal at its 1907 Metropolitan Opera premiere that the remaining scheduled performances were canceled. Seattle Opera takes up the still-provocative work for the first time in almost a quarter-century in Bruno Ravella’s production, originally staged by Irish National Opera in 2024. American soprano Brenda Rae makes her role debut as Salome, taking on one of Strauss’ most demanding heroines.

Oct. 17-31; McCaw Hall, 321 Mercer St., Seattle; tickets from $39; seattleopera.org

For another dose of German operatic intensity, look south, where Tacoma Opera is tackling a challenge once closely associated with Seattle Opera: The company’s ongoing “Ring” cycle reaches “Die Walküre.” 

Oct. 9 and 11; Pantages Theater, 901 Broadway, Tacoma; tickets from $34; tacomaopera.org

Bruce Liu piano recital at Meany Center 

Bruce Liu, winner of the 2021 Chopin Competition, is a standout in Meany Center’s fall season. His playing fuses clarity and wit with an appealing streak of fire, qualities well suited to a program that ranges from Bach, Beethoven and Chopin to the kinetic play of Ligeti’s “Fanfares” and the elusive world of Mompou, before Liszt’s “Rhapsodie espagnole” brings things to a flamboyant close.

Oct. 20; Meany Hall — Katharyn Alvord Gerlich Theater, University of Washington, Seattle; tickets from $64 ($13 UW students); meanycenter.org

Bach’s B Minor Mass at Seattle Bach Festival

Seattle Bach Festival continues its exploration of its namesake with the Mass in B minor, bringing together artists deeply rooted in the region’s musical life. In this vast, intricately expressive work, Bach gathers a lifetime of experience — of music and of life. The festival’s historically informed orchestra joins the Evergreen Ensemble and vocal soloists for performances that are also among the main concert events of the Early Music America Summit, a three-day Seattle gathering of performers, scholars and presenters from across the early music field.

Oct. 24 at Seattle First Baptist Church, 1111 Harvard Ave., Seattle; also in Tacoma (Oct. 23) at Mason United Methodist Church, 2710 N. Madison St., Tacoma, and in Lynnwood (Oct. 25) at Trinity Lutheran Church, 6215 196th St. S.W., Lynnwood; tickets from $55 (free for students); seattlebachfestival.org

Isidore String Quartet at Seattle Chamber Music Society 

The Isidore String Quartet, whose members include Seattle-born violinist Adrian Steele, appears as part of Seattle Chamber Music Society’s Signature Series, which extends SCMS’ chamber music programming between its winter and summer festivals.

Winners of the 2022 Banff International String Quartet Competition — one of the world’s leading chamber music competitions — they pair quartets by Mozart and Beethoven with Grammy-winning composer and jazz pianist Billy Childs’ new String Quartet No. 4, “American Mosaic,” written for the ensemble.

Oct. 25; Benaroya Hall, 200 University St., Seattle; single tickets $81 ($36 for 30 and under); seattlechambermusic.org 

‘Journeys’ at Music of Remembrance 

Music of Remembrance, the Seattle organization that has spent nearly three decades using music to confront persecution and human-rights abuses, opens its season with the staged program “Journeys.” Composer Steve Reich turns 90 this fall, and MOR marks the occasion with “Different Trains,” in which he juxtaposes memories of childhood train journeys across America with testimony from Holocaust survivors about their experiences in wartime Europe. The landmark 1988 work is joined by Sahba Aminikia’s “Stormy Seas,” drawn from the experiences of five young refugees who fled by boat, songs about women sheltered at the wartime refugee camp in Oswego, N.Y., and music by George Walker.

Nov. 1; Benaroya Hall, 200 University St., Seattle; tickets $60 ($25 students); musicofremembrance.org

Monteverdi’s ‘Vespers of 1610’ with Vox Luminis

Early Music Seattle brings the acclaimed Belgian ensemble Vox Luminis to St. James Cathedral for Monteverdi’s“Vespers of 1610,” a landmark poised between the Renaissance and Baroque. A pivotal figure in the development of opera, Monteverdi brings a theatrical sensibility to sacred music, combining traditional polyphony with virtuosic writing for solo voices, chorus and instruments — music especially at home in the cathedral’s resonant space.

Nov. 20; St. James Cathedral, 804 Ninth Ave., Seattle; tickets from $68; earlymusicseattle.org