Performance Today®

Violist and Chef Toby Appel cooks an amazing meal with Fred Child during the 2018 Music From Angel Fire Music Festival.

Despite their tragic ending, Romeo and Juliet have become one of the most famous couples of all time. On this episode of Performance Today, we'll explore the music of love and devotion with selections from Romeo and Juliet, by Sergei Prokofiev.

Fanny Mendelssohn wrote more than 500 pieces of music, and she also was a conductor. One musician recalled, "A gesture of her little finger ran like an electric shock through our souls." More about the multi-talented Fanny Mendelssohn this edition of Performance Today.

Rachel Barton Pine is much more than a fine violinist. She has some concerns about the future of classical music in American society, and she's doing something about it. On this episode of Performance Today, Rachel Barton Pine joins us in the studio and tells us about the next big phase of her career.

Violinist and composer Fritz Kreisler wrote a concerto in 1927, but for about eight years, he claimed it had been written in the early 1700s, by Antonio Vivaldi. Why? On this episode of Performance Today, hear the story and the music: violinist Pekka Kuusisto leads the Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra in a live performance of Kreisler's Violin Concerto in C Major.

In 1908, Igor Stravinsky wrote a piece of music and proudly sent a copy to his mentor, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, but the package was returned unopened, with a shocking note attached. On this episode of Performance Today, hear the Los Angeles Philharmonic play the music that was returned to its sender: Fireworks, by Igor Stravinsky.

Tiffany Poon is a 22 year-old music student at Yale. In the past year, her stream of self-produced video diary entries (vlogs) have made her a classical music star on YouTube and Instagram. But she feels strongly that she is a pianist FIRST, who happens to make videos on the side. Meet Tiffany Poon on this episode of Performance Today.

Carl Maria von Weber wrote an entire movement of his Clarinet Quintet in ONE day...but then his creativity dried up. It took von Weber four years to finish the rest of it. Find out what finally gave him the kick in the pants to finish, on this episode of Performance Today.

In 1908, Igor Stravinsky wrote a piece of music and proudly sent a copy to his mentor, Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, but the package was returned unopened, with a shocking note attached. On this episode of Performance Today, hear the Los Angeles Philharmonic play the music that was returned to its sender: Fireworks, by Igor Stravinsky.