Johann Sebastian Bach's Brandenburg Concertos were one of the most creative job applications ever. He wrote half a dozen innovative concertos hoping to get hired by a German prince; as a job application, they were a failure. But as music, they are immortal. On Tuesday's Performance Today, we'll hear Bach's Brandenburg Concerto No. 3 from a concert at the Grand Teton Music Festival.
You know how you sometimes put something down and then can't remember where you left it? It happens to us all -- even composers. In the 1760s, Joseph Haydn lost a cello concerto. And that concerto was missing until the 1960s, a two full centuries later! On Monday's Performance Today, we'll hear a performance of Haydn's long-lost Cello Concerto from a concert in Houston.
On this weekend's Performance Today, we'll hear Joshua Roman play Tchaikovsky's Rococo Variations - a theme with a set of elegant and virtuosic variations for cello and orchestra. Plus, Bruce Adolphe joins us for this week's Piano Puzzler.
Over the span of two centuries, the Bach family produced more than 50 musicians and composers. On Friday's Performance Today, we have music by Bach -- but not the guy who immediately comes to mind when you hear that name. We'll travel to Denmark to hear an overture by Johann Bernhard Bach, Johann Sebastian Bach's lesser-known second cousin.
Robert Schumann wrote in his diary, "Drums and trumpets have been blaring in my head. I have no idea what will come of it..." On Thursday's Performance Today, we'll hear what came of it: Schumann's Symphony No. 2 is on the way from a concert in England.
On Wednesday's Performance Today, we'll hear Joshua Roman play Tchaikovsky's Rococo Variations - a theme with a set of elegant and virtuosic variations for cello and orchestra. Plus, Bruce Adolphe joins us for this week's Piano Puzzler.
Here at PT, our bounty of concert highlights is as boundless as the sea. And our love for music as deep; the more we give to thee, the more we have - for both are infinite. So, on Tuesday's Performance Today, we'll hear music from Prokofiev's ballet Romeo and Juliet.
The Isle of the Dead is a painting of a dark, forbidding island. After viewing it, Sergei Rachmaninoff was inspired to write a symphonic poem; a musical depiction of the journey of a newly departed soul. On Monday's Performance Today, we'll hear the Nashville Symphony perform Rachmaninoff's Isle of the Dead in concert in Nashville.
If you saw Mickey Mouse in "Fantasia," you might remember the moral of the story: don't try to do too much. French composer Paul Dukas followed that advice. He wrote one opera, one ballet, one symphony, and one famous tone poem - The Sorcerer's Apprentice. On this weekend's Performance Today, we'll hear that piece from a concert in Buffalo, New York.
