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.
When composer and pianist Timo Andres saw a partially incomplete piano score part by Mozart, he jumped at an opportunity. He discusses his own recomposition of Mozart's Coronation Concerto and why we shouldn't always put composers up on a marble pedestal. And for the Rosh Hashanah Holiday, a 21st century concerto for Shofar, Trombone and Orchestra.
Of all the great composers, Tchaikovsky may have been the biggest curmudgeon to his fellow composers, including Bach, Brahms and Strauss. But he loved Mozart's music so much he wrote an orchestra suite as a tribute: the "Mozartiana." We also hear Nigel Kennedy performing Vivaldi at the 2013 BBC Proms, and we field PT listener comments over his controversial comments on stage. On Thursday's Performance Today, from APM.
The sonorous call of the Shofar, a ram's horn, is especially significant for the beginning of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. We recognize the start of the high holiday with a performance of Ernst Bloch's Hebraic Rhapsody for Cello and Orchestra, which imitates the booming sound of the Shofar. We have this week's Piano Puzzler, plus music from Scandinavia, on Wednesday's Performance Today.
Simone Dinnerstein talks about the enduring appeal of songs by Leonard Cohen. She'll introduce us to a new piece for piano based on Cohen's music. Plus we hear from star violinist Leonidas Kavakos on a rarely performed Szymanowski concerto, on Tuesday's Performance Today.
In the mid-1500s, astronomer Nicholas Copernicus came up with a radical theory. The idea that the planets go around the sun, not around the earth. The annual summer music festival in Lugano, Switzerland has something similar. There, things don't revolve around a sun, but around Martha Argerich. We'll visit the Martha Argerich Project, a month-long festival where young, up-and-coming players get to rehearse and perform with the living legend of the piano, on Monday's Performance Today.
It's the final weekend of the summer season. Labor Day weekend. We'll hear summertime music from concerts in Dallas, in Minneapolis, and in New York City. Plus, Bruce Adolphe joins us for this week's piano puzzler, on this weekend's Performance Today.
It's the final weekend of the summer season. Labor Day weekend. We'll hear summertime music from concerts in Dallas, in Minneapolis, and in New York City. Plus, a Gold Medal performance from Stanislav Khristenko, winner of the Cleveland Piano Competition. On Friday's Performance Today.
Listen to this live performance by Brooklyn Rider from the Minnesota State Fair.
When Johann Sebastian Bach arrived at the court of King Frederick the Great, the King had a wickedly convoluted little tune that he gave to Bach. He asked Bach to improvise around it. No problem for the old master. Coming up, a gorgeous Trio Sonata that Bach wrote, based on the King's little tune. It's on Thursday's Performance Today, from a concert at the Music@Menlo Festival, in Silicon Valley.
