Performance Today®

with host Valerie Kahler

American Public Media’s Performance Today® is America’s most popular classical music radio program and a winner of the 2014 Gabriel Award for artistic achievement. The show is broadcast on hundreds of public radio stations across the country, including at 1 p.m. central weekdays on Minnesota Public Radio. More information about our stations can be found at APM Distribution.

All Episodes

Tania Leon describes Leonard Bernstein's 'Maria'

Tania Leon describes Leonard Bernstein's 'Maria'

Sure, the song 'Maria' from Leonard Bernstein's musical 'West Side Story' is lovely. For composer and conductor Tania Leon, it meant so much more. 'Maria' set in motion her dream of a possible life in America. Leon remembers her mentor, friend, salsa dancer and Spanish-speaker Leonard Bernstein.

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Bright Sheng on Bernstein

Bright Sheng on Bernstein

When composer Bright Sheng met Leonard Bernstein, he wowed the maestro with his talent. Not musical talent at first, but his skills in the kitchen. Bright Sheng and Leonard Bernstein...and Peking duck, on Tuesday's Performance Today.

Bright Sheng on meeting Leonard Bernstein

Bright Sheng on meeting Leonard Bernstein

When Bright Sheng went to the Tanglewood Summer Music Festival as a young composer, he didn't think his Peking Duck would lead to a meeting with Leonard Bernstein. Bernstein left impressed by the music and thrilled by Sheng's cooking. Those minutes in the kitchen made Sheng "Tanglewood famous," he says, and was the beginning of a long working relationship with Bernstein.

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Longing for home

Longing for home

After fighting in the Austrian army during the first World War, composer and violinist Fritz Kreisler moved to the US, where, initially, he didn't receive a warm welcome. Kreisler missed his home in Vienna, and he wrote that sense of longing into music. On Monday's Performance Today, we'll hear his String Quartet in A minor, from a live performance recorded at the Music@Menlo festival.

Anagrams and Mental Jotto

Anagrams and Mental Jotto

Leonard Bernstein's love of word play and competitive drive was notorious. Whether it was anagrams or mental jotto, Bernstein's former assistant Charlie Harmon says there were few who could beat him. And if you did, his daughter Jamie Bernstein said, you might wish you hadn't.

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Andre Watts and Bernstein

Andre Watts and Bernstein

Leonard Bernstein took a keen interest in helping many of his fellow musicians. He launched dozens of careers, including that of pianist Andre Watts. Less than a week after Watts debuted on stage with Bernstein and the NY Philharmonic, they made what became a best-selling recording. Hear it on this weekend's Performance Today.

Composer Thierry Escaich

Composer Thierry Escaich

Composer Thierry Escaich uses traditional melodies as a starting point, then moves them to unexpected territory. On Friday's Performance Today, hear the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra perform "Psalmos, Concerto for Orchestra" by Thierry Escaich.

Tilson Thomas and Bernstein

Tilson Thomas and Bernstein

Conductor, composer, pianist Michael Tilson Thomas says few people realize how rooted Leonard Bernstein was in Jewish Theater. Thomas says that shared interest created an immediate bond between them.

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Composer, Pianist...and Prime Minister of Poland

Composer, Pianist...and Prime Minister of Poland

Ignacy Jan Paderewski was a dashing, virtuoso pianist around the turn of the 20th century. In 1919, he was the Prime Minister of Poland (his signature is on the Treaty of Versailles). On Thursday's Performance Today, hear Paderewski's Piano Concerto No. 1 from a concert in his hometown of Warsaw, Poland.

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