Performance Today®

Maurice Ravel wrote his Mother Goose Suite as piano pieces for children. But then he realized that fairy tales aren't just for kids, so he turned the music into a lush piece for full orchestra. On Monday's Performance Today, we'll go to a concert in Hamburg, Germany to hear Ravel's grown-up take on Mother Goose.

Every week on our Piano Puzzler, composer Bruce Adolphe re-writes a familiar tune in the style of a classical composer. Play along on this weekend's Performance Today; see if you can guess the tune and the composer whose style Bruce is mimicking.

On Friday's Performance Today, we'll explore the symphonic side of Halloween. Concert highlights will include performances of the "Symphony Fantastique" by Hector Berlioz, Osvaldo Golijov's "Night of the Flying Horses," and music from 21st-century American composer, Jonathan Bartz.

The French artist Jean-Antoine Watteau painted an island where every romantic dream becomes a reality. Claude Debussy used Watteau's dreamland as inspiration for a piece called the Island of Joy. Pianist Marc-Andre Hamelin will take us there on Thursday's Performance Today.

When Richard Strauss was a baby, he cried when he heard the violin. But when he heard the French Horn, he smiled. His father played horn in the Munich Court Opera. Strauss grew up to write two great concertos for the horn. We'll go to a concert in Berlin to hear the Munich Philharmonic play the Second Horn Concerto by Strauss...on the next Performance Today, from APM.

Sergei Rachmaninoff didn't think he was much good at writing symphonies. But that didn't stop him from composing three of them. On Tuesday's Performance Today, we'll hear the Houston Symphony perform Rachmaninoff's beautifully energetic and romantic Symphony No. 2.

The Sinfonietta Riga is a new and vibrant young orchestra. With an average age of 27, they're on a mission to bring youth and vitality to everything they play. On Monday's Performance Today, we'll go to their hometown of Riga, Latvia to hear them perform Josef Haydn's Symphony No. 85 in concert.

On this weekend's Performance Today, composer Bruce Adolphe joins us with our weekly musical game. Play along; see if you can name the hidden tune and the composer whose style Bruce is mimicking. Plus, we'll hear musical highlights from concert halls from Los Angeles to Hamburg.

English composer Thomas Ades is a huge fan of Francois Couperin's 18th century keyboard music. So much so, he rewrote three of the French composer's pieces for orchestra. On Friday's Performance Today, we'll hear conductor Jeffrey Kahane lead the Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra in a performance of Ades's "Three Studies from Couperin."