As far as gambling goes, it’s a pretty safe bet there’s no other venue on earth where the likes of standards crooner Tony Bennett appears alongside rapper T.I. or country mega-stars Lady Antebellum being within earshot of The Smiths’ singer turned solo alt-rock god Morrissey throughout a single season. But holding the distinction of being the longest-running music festival in America dating back over a century, Ravinia’s more than earned the right and reputation to boast one of the most exceptionally diverse line-ups anywhere. So whether its local blues legend Buddy Guy, “Englishman In Chicago” Sting, hip-hop combo Queen Latifah and Common, ballad belter Josh Groban, soulman Lionel Richie, pop princess Kesha or the annual summer residency of the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, there’s surely something to please every palette. Learn more about the massive unveiling from Ravinia Festival President and CEO Welz Kauffman in a wide-ranging conversation with Chicago Concert Reviews, edited for length, but never at the expense of articulating the one-of-a-kind Ravinia experience.

What are the newest Ravinia attractions that are getting people talking?

Welz Kauffman: One is a lot of excitement, interest and enthusiasm around us continuing to celebrate the most important of American musicians, Leonard Bernstein. I think a lot of people who were with us last summer for the actual centennial knew that there was more depth to plum, more works of his that we didn’t have a chance to do, more composers that he championed like very few others that we could do more with…A key thing is bringing his “Mass” (Jul. 20) back to us after its Ravinia premiere last summer, a piece that’s had a troubled history, but was easily in my time the most talked about, most successful, most moving, most powerful anything that I’ve been connected to in terms of audience connection. I still get emails from people who want to know if we’re going to do it again, how it touched them and how it makes them feel today in the world that we’re living. The idea to bring it back was really based on that enthusiastic reaction, but also so many people whose friends told them how great it was, but they themselves didn’t go, so we wanted to give everybody a second chance. We’re also doing “Candide” (Aug. 28), we’re doing “Songfest” (Jun. 20), we’re doing “Trouble In Tahiti” (Aug. 22), we’re doing Mahler’s “Symphony No. 8” (Jul 26), obviously a piece that Lenny didn’t write, but we wouldn’t have Mahler in our world the way we do today without him. We’re doing “On The Waterfront” (Aug. 9) and “West Side Story” (Jul. 12). Just the idea of Steven Spielberg doing a new version with Rita Moreno is thrilling in its conception, but also shows the relevance of the work itself and his incomparable score.

Then the other piece is the Ravinia Music Box Experience Center, [an intimate theater and museum gallery space], which will open this summer and is under construction right now. It’s something we’ve been discussing within the Ravinia family and really the classical world has been discussing for over a hundred years…[regarding] the fact that the classical music audience seemed to be dwindling, which we hear in the business all the time. What we wanted to do at Ravinia was not just wring our hands and worry about that, but actually try and figure out if we could get to the bottom of some unique Ravinia opportunities that we could celebrate that might be different from an indoor concert hall in a winter season kind of experience. And that’s where this idea came from with a variety of wonderful consultants who surveyed our audience and wanted to find out what they were looking for and what they thought about classical music. That’s been an invigorating experience. I’ve never worked in a place where the courage to really survey people and ask them things that they might not want the answers to would be asked. We’re excited about that particular 2019 Ravinia moment.

As always and perhaps even more so, there seems to be a tremendous amount of diversity in genres and generations. Why is that balance so important, as opposed to going just the traditional or trendy route?

Kauffman: It’s a great honor to hear that from someone who knows the business really well and has been covering it for a while. I appreciate that. I think for any institution to stay viable, you need to be open to embracing any audience that’s out there and that would be the case, whether we were talking 50 years ago or today, but today I think it’s even more important because today’s audience are less niche-based. Let’s take the classical world for a second. It used to be you only loved opera or you loved Baroque music or you only loved romantic piano music or big pounding orchestra works or contemporary work. Now people are much more omnivorous in what they want to take on and the same goes for the non-classical side of things. I look at our audience who will come to a Mahler symphony and Morrissey (Sept. 14) and Tony Bennett (Jun. 21) and be equally satisfied by all.

Now part of that is the Ravinia experience, which we’ve been trying to get right and we will continue to try to get right, although you’re never going to get it quite right for everybody (laughter). But there’s certain things, the screens, the way you hear and see the shows, the restaurants, that are hugely important. It can’t just be what’s on stage, but of course must begin with what’s on stage. I think we’re at a golden time for what I think Ravinia has always been…We have the summer home of one of the greatest orchestras ever to exist in the history of music and we’ve got Lionel Richie (Jun. 11-12) and we’ve got Tash Sultana (Jun. 1) and Sting (Aug. 23-24) and Chicago (Aug. 10-11) and Steely Dan (Sept. 1-2) and Tony Bennett continues to come and Ramsey Lewis (May 31) and Buddy Guy (Jun. 14), along with all the great classical stuff…

It just doesn’t get better than that anywhere in the world, not because we’re so great at it, we’re just fortunate artists like to come to us and have a wonderful time and that people are still enjoying the lawn. Who knew? There was a time in the business where people thought lawn audiences would kind of go away. Everybody would want a reserved seat and I think what we now know is there are a lot of young families that want to bring their kids and the lawn is the best opportunity for them, not just from an expense point of view, but also from the informality and the social point of view and that’s true of a Beethoven symphony or “Bohemian Rhapsody.” That’s why I love walking the park an hour or two before the show begins because I never know who’s going to be there.

Who would you say are the most significant scores in terms of new debuts? Lionel Richie, Morrissey and Queen Latifah, who very rarely tours, all come to mind for me.

Kauffman: I would agree with all of those. I’m really glad you mentioned them. I think Kesha (Sept. 8) is a real score for us as far as new audiences. I think that Lady A. (Jul. 10) is a real score for us and one we’ve been trying for a while. Sometimes artists of a certain genre don’t want to go to a venue if they don’t see their equivalents already there. In country, it was Carrie Underwood that broke that ice for us and that opened things up for Little Big Town (Jun. 28) and Sugarland (Jun. 30) and now Lady A. Nickelback (Aug. 13-14), I’m a huge fan, plus lots of classical artists that we’ve not seen before.

Do any returning favorites come to mind that you simply had to have back?

Kauffman: Lots of veterans, like having James Galway (Sept. 10) around all the time makes me happy. Ramsey Lewis after all the talk of his farewell doing our opening night. John Patitucci (Jun. 8), the extraordinary jazz bass player, is coming to do a masterclass for the Steans Music Institute jazz kids and for a concert with the Harlem Quartet. Pentatonix (Aug. 15) is coming back, Maxwell (Jul. 9) is coming back, Common returning with Queen Latifah (Aug. 31)…Jennifer Hudson (Jul. 14) doing our gala with the symphony is fantastic. We’ve had JHUD before, but not with an orchestra. It’s pretty exciting stuff.

Which shows would you suggest concertgoers secure their tickets for sooner than later?

Kauffman: Well Sting certainly would always be one, Chicago would be one, Lionel Richie, because he’s never been with us before and also because he’s got all those hits and is such a terrific artist. Morrissey, Kesha, Queen Latifah and Common, Maxwell, Tony Bennett always. I think things like “Mass,” the Renée Fleming commissioned piece “Penelope” (Jul. 28), Pentatonix, Nickelback, Sarah McLachlan (Aug. 12), lots of terrific things.

Are there any non-classical Ravinia exclusives that aren’t on tour or combinations that are specifically unique to this season? I haven’t seen any other dates with The Beach Boys and Ringo Starr.

Kauffman: The Beach Boys and Ringo (Aug. 3-4) is unique. I know Ringo’s playing elsewhere and The Beach Boys are playing elsewhere. I think that’s something Ringo wanted to do at Ravinia. Now I could be wrong because we were the first date booked and announced and he may have added things since then, but I’ll tell you an interesting part. It’s great to have a Beatle and it’s great to have The Beach Boys, but both those groups were Leonard Bernstein’s favorite bands and I love the fact that they’re together as we continue to celebrate this amazing American musician. I asked one of his children [about his favorites]. I knew about The Beatles, but I didn’t know about The Beach Boys. But he was really fascinated by the theremin, which is celebrating its 100th anniversary this year in case you didn’t know…He was really fascinated by the sound of that, [which provided] the signature sound of “Good Vibrations,” but also the genius of Brian Wilson, along with the genius of [John] Lennon and [Paul] McCartney.

What are the greatest joys of your job?

Kauffman: So many. It certainly is the programming piece. It’s always challenging, but it’s always exciting and incredibly fun. We’re living in a really golden time for music of all kinds. There are so many terrific musicians out there. I don’t know if it’s because of YouTube, but we’re hearing more and seeing more and it’s easy for people to make themselves available to us worldwide. I don’t know if our schools and our conservatoires turning out a better level or talent and performing, but it’s an exciting time to be a presenter. That combined with the work we do with little kids is just thrilling to me, a personal thrill going back to my parents both being school teachers. And just walking through the park. I get to work in a park! Who gets to do that?

How about the challenges?

Kauffman: Everything’s relative, right? Are the things that I might mention going to sound kind of low compared to other challenges people are going through? Probably. But certainly in my heart and my soul, what I want more than anything else is that if somebody’s got the classical music gene, I want to be able to find that person. That’s my big goal and that is a challenge because sometimes the person themselves doesn’t know that they have it. I didn’t know that I had it when I was a little kid and I started to take piano lessons. It was a complete fluke. There was none of that in my family. So there was no way to sort of connect to it simply. But I think that’s the big thing, and raising money of course, and working with the city fathers, and making sure neighbors are happy. That’s a big part of what we do here, that’s fun, but it’s got its challenges definitely. We want to be able to make sure we can present the great artists we want to present and keep Highland Park the way it should be, but also invite people in.

Who are some of the artists you’re personally excited about seeing?

Kauffman: I’m personally very excited about doing “Coco” (Sept. 15) with a live orchestra. It’s such a beautiful score and such a powerful, fun, important film. Tash Sultana is definitely at the top of my list. She’s not been around very long, but I’m a huge fan. John Prine (Jun. 8) in his golden prime time. He’s one of the great singer/songwriters of all time. I’m a big Josh Groban (Jun. 7) fan, and after having seen him on Broadway, even more so, so I’m excited he’s coming back for us, and then Rob Thomas (Jun. 6). You mentioned Queen Latifiah and Common. Common had such a fantastic debut with us a couple seasons ago, and this combo of Christine Ebersole and Michael Feinstein (Aug. 29). They’re good musical and human friends and I think that’s going to be a really wonderful show. Pentatonix just knock me out every single time and I can’t believe what they do. Nickelback, personally because it’s part of late college and graduate school [for me] and things like that. I always like Chicago and Steely Dan and Sting, just these marvelous artists, plus the country artists that I love. Little Big Town, Sugarland and Lady A. are within a couple of weeks of each other. Maxwell, T.I. (Jul. 2), I could go on and I know that sounds like I’m just reading off the list, but so many have not been with us before or haven’t been with us for a while, so I’m particularly excited about that. And Kesha definitely. I just want to see who’s gonna come!

And last but not least, who’s on your all-time wish list for the future?

Kauffman: The top of the list is Stevie Wonder. He’s the golden one!

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For a list of upcoming Ravinia concerts, visit Ravinia.org.