Performance Today®

As a high school student in Huntsville, Alabama, Susanna Phillips never once considered a career as an opera singer. A school guidance counselor encouraged her to just apply to a conservatory. So she did. The Juilliard-trained soprano is now appearing on major opera stages all over the world, gracing the pages of Vogue magazine and chatting in the studio with host Fred Child about her surprising, overwhelming success.

On Wednesday's Performance Today, pianist Helene Grimaud unravels the Second Piano Concerto by Johannes Brahms. The music reveals an older, wiser composer who struggled with his identity as an artist. Grimaud's performance with the Vienna Philharmonic is on the way, plus composer Bruce Adolphe has this week's Piano Puzzler.

On Tuesday's Performance Today, pianist Helene Grimaud continues her tour-guide through the piano concertos by Johannes Brahms. She sees the Adagio movement from the first concerto as Brahms' lovelorn prayer to Clara Schumann, his "impossible love." Grimaud performs it with astonishing emotional sensitivity in Munich with the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra.

Johannes Brahms composed two monumental piano concertos twenty three years apart. Starting on Monday's Performance Today, pianist Helene Grimaud leads a four-day exploration of both works, beginning with the youthful energy in the first concerto in D minor.

This weekend on Performance Today from APM, The King's Singers join Fred Child for conversation and performance in the PT studio. Six voices singing choral music, as one. Plus, composer Bruce Adolphe has this week's Piano Puzzler to test your musical riddle-solving skills.

In the same way that an illustrator might sketch out ideas for future works of art, Felix Mendelssohn sketched out musical ideas for his compositions. On Friday's Performance Today, conductor Riccardo Chailly tells the story of Mendelssohn's creative process and a symphony fifteen years in the making.

In 1944, Aaron Copland was paid $500 to compose a ballet score for dancer Martha Graham. That's low by today's standards, but the result, Appalachian Spring, became an American classic and won him the Pulitzer Prize. On Thursday's Performance Today from APM, we'll hear the River Oaks Chamber Orchestra perform this Americana gem in Houston, Texas.

In the spring of 2009, cellist Truls Mork contracted Lyme disease from a tick bite. With serious symptoms that impacted his playing, his career was at a standstill. After fighting off the infection and undergoing years of recovery, Mork is performing again. On Wednesday's Performance Today, we'll hear him play the Schumann Cello Concerto in concert in Paris.

Two monumental concertos from recent European concerts are ahead on Tuesday's Performance Today, from APM. From Amsterdam, Emily Beynon brings out the barbaric side of the Flute Concerto by Carl Nielsen. And from Hannover, Germany, Daniel Hope plays the towering Violin Concerto No. 1 by Max Bruch.