Minnesota Orchestra brings Hitchcock's Vertigo to Orchestra Hall for Halloween weekend

The orchestra plays Bernard Herrmann's score live under the film this Friday and Saturday, a home-hall date from the Live at Orchestra Hall series.

Picture the lights going down on Nicollet Mall this Friday, a screen above the stage and a full orchestra below it, and the first spiralling notes of a score that has been making audiences dizzy since 1958. That is the plan for Halloween weekend at Orchestra Hall.

The Minnesota Orchestra presents Alfred Hitchcock's *Vertigo* with the film on screen and Bernard Herrmann's score played live, on Friday, October 30 and Saturday, October 31, 2026, at Orchestra Hall in downtown Minneapolis. The orchestra's own listing pitches it plainly: Hitchcock's classic thriller, with what it calls Herrmann's "harrowing score," timed for Halloween weekend.

It is a home game in the truest sense. Orchestra Hall is where this ensemble lives, and in our records the Minnesota Orchestra has played the Twin Cities more than any other market by a wide margin, with 344 shows logged here. The room seats a little over 2,000, which is big enough for a full symphonic sound and intimate enough that a sustained string chord under a rooftop chase scene can land right in your chest.

The *Vertigo* dates are part of Live at Orchestra Hall, the orchestra's series of film screenings and crossover programs. In announcing the 2026-27 season, the orchestra said that series is curated and primarily conducted by Sarah Hicks, its principal conductor of Live at Orchestra Hall. Check the orchestra's event page for who is on the podium each night.

Film-with-orchestra nights have become one of the reliable ways into Orchestra Hall for people who would never buy a subscription to a Mahler cycle, and *Vertigo* is a smart pick for the format. Herrmann's music does a great deal of the storytelling in that film, the obsessive, circling themes doing what the dialogue won't, and hearing it played by a full orchestra instead of through a cinema's speakers is the whole point of going. It also gives the players something meatier than wall-to-wall cues: this is a score that classical audiences already take seriously on its own terms.

For anyone mapping out the holiday weekend, the two nights give some flexibility. Friday works as the grown-up Halloween option before the costume parties; Saturday is Halloween itself, which means you can go in costume or come straight from one. Either way, this is not a horror movie, so the kids who want jump scares may find more of them in the lobby than on screen.

The 2026-27 season continues to lean on the Live at Orchestra Hall series. The same season announcement points to How to Train Your Dragon with Hicks conducting over Thanksgiving, so the film-night habit you pick up this weekend has somewhere to go next.

Tickets and the full night-by-night details are on the Minnesota Orchestra's own calendar page for *Vertigo*. Go early, find your seat and let the screen go dark. The rest is Herrmann's job.

Sources: Vertigo - Minnesota Orchestra (minnesotaorchestra.org); The Minnesota Orchestra Announces 2026-27 Season (minnesotaorchestra.org); A Space for Sound: Introducing the 2026-27 Season (minnesotaorchestra.org); Vertigo (film) - Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org)