If you are coming into Minneapolis for a night at Orchestra Hall this fall, the easiest place to stay is a mansion on the other side of Loring Park. 300 Clifton, the Eugene J. Carpenter Mansion, sits under a mile from the Minnesota Orchestra’s home at 1111 Nicollet Mall — close enough to walk up the Mall in good weather, and close enough that a five-minute ride home gets you into the garden hot tub while the encore is still in your head. Here is what is on the calendar between now and the New Year, and how to make a whole evening of it.
What is playing at Orchestra Hall this fall?
The 2026–27 season opens on Friday, September 25 and Saturday, September 26 with Thomas Søndergård conducting Stravinsky’s Firebird, followed by a second opening-week program of Mozart and Prokofiev on October 1–3. From there the Minnesota Orchestra calendar alternates classical weekends with films, jazz and pop nights that fill the hall with people who have never bought a symphony ticket in their lives:
- October 8–11: Return of the Jedi in Concert — four performances, the orchestra playing the score live under the film.
- Tuesday, October 13: Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis. A midweek night, which usually means a quieter mansion and a better rate.
- October 16–17: Pictures at an Exhibition.
- October 22–23: Haydn and Liszt (the Thursday is an 11 AM morning concert — book the night before and stroll over after coffee).
- Saturday, October 24: Ben Folds with the Minnesota Orchestra.
- October 30–31: Hitchcock’s Vertigo with live orchestra — on Halloween weekend, in a city with a haunted mansion to sleep in afterward.
- November 5–14: the Nordic Soundscapes Festival — Sibelius with Søndergård the first weekend, Nielsen with Osmo Vänskä the second, and a family concert of Hans Christian Andersen tales on Sunday, November 8.
- November 19–21: Elgar and Dvořák on Thursday and Friday, then Andrew Bird with the orchestra on Saturday.
- November 28–29: How to Train Your Dragon in Concert, over Thanksgiving weekend.
- December: A Charlie Brown Christmas (December 8–9), Home Alone in Concert (December 11–13), Handel’s Messiah (December 18–19) and a New Year’s Eve celebration on the 31st.
Dates and programs come straight from the Orchestra’s own calendar as of mid-September; always confirm times on their site before you book, because start times vary from 11 AM to 8 PM depending on the night.
Where should you stay near Orchestra Hall?
Downtown hotels will put you a block from the stage door, and there is nothing wrong with that. But a concert is two hours; the rest of the evening happens somewhere else. 300 Clifton gives you a National Register mansion in Loring Park with eight distinct room types, a four-season garden hot tub under the stars, and Gertrude’s Cistern — the speakeasy and haunted video lounge in the cellar, with heated reclining seats — for the hour after you get home when you are not ready to sleep yet.
If you are making a date of it, the Georgian Room (en-suite king with a sitting area) and the Grand Edwardian are the two most-requested. The Crystal Mansion Room is the showpiece. The Carriage House rooms — the Coachman’s, the Forge and the Hayloft — are quieter and a little more private, and the Estate Rooms are the value option with a shared bath. We walked through all of them in our room-by-room guide.
How do you get from Loring Park to Orchestra Hall?
On foot, in September and October: out the front gate, along the edge of Loring Park, and up Nicollet Mall to 11th Street. It is under a mile and it is one of the prettier walks in the city at dusk. In November and December, when the walk home at 10 PM is a colder proposition, a rideshare from the hall to the mansion is a few minutes, and Nicollet Mall is served by buses you can plan on Metro Transit’s trip planner. If you drive, here is how parking works at the mansion, and you can leave the car there for the night.
Making a whole evening of it
Check-in is at 3 PM, which leaves time to settle in before an evening curtain. Guests who book directly with us receive a $20 dining voucher per stay for the Pillsbury Club, the private club inside the Charles S. Pillsbury Mansion a short drive south of the park — an early dinner beneath 400-year-old English oak is a fitting overture to a night at the symphony. (The same booking earns a $20 voucher toward a Minneapolis Trolley Tours ride, if you are staying a second night.)
After the concert, the mansion is yours: the hot tub, the movie room, the parlors. Breakfast is not served on site, but there is complimentary coffee in the common area and check-out is a civilized 10 AM. If your concert is one of the Thursday 11 AM performances, stay the night before, take your coffee on the veranda, and walk over — you will be home by two.
Which nights book up first?
Halloween weekend (Vertigo, October 30–31) and Thanksgiving weekend (How to Train Your Dragon, November 28–29) are the two to lock in early, because both collide with everything else happening downtown those weekends. The Tuesday Wynton Marsalis date on October 13 and the Thursday-morning classical concerts are the opposite: midweek, quieter, and usually the best value of the season at the mansion. We wrote about the same midweek logic for Timberwolves nights at Target Center, and for New Year’s Eve, if the December 31 concert is your plan.
Pick your program, then check availability at 300 Clifton for the night. The orchestra will handle the music; we will handle the hot tub.
Keep reading: Where should you stay for Twin Cities Con 2026 at the Minneapolis Convention Center?