Performance Today®

Two musical games in the show today. Claude Debussy wrote music for a ballet about a game of tennis. Debussy called it simply Jeux, or Games. We'll hear a performance by the Los Angeles Philharmonic. And Bruce Adolphe drops by for our weekly PT game, the Piano Puzzler. This week's very special guest is organist Cameron Carpenter.

Czech composer Bedrich Smetana wrote a set of tone poems that he called Ma Vlast. A literal translation is My Country. But a more idiomatic translation might be My Homeland, a name that gives that sense of groundedness and belonging. Today and tomorrow, a look at Smetana's homeland. We'll hear four of the six pieces, including the most famous, The Moldau.

Modest Mussorgsky's biggest hit wasn't a hit at all, as far as he knew. Mussorgsky wrote Pictures at an Exhibition as a work for solo piano. It wasn't even published until after his death. He had no way of knowing that his quirky piano piece would turn out to be one of the greatest orchestral hits of all time, thanks to Maurice Ravel and a host of other composers who've made orchestrations of it. The Vienna Philharmonic plays Ravel's version, in the Gardens of Schonbrunn Palace.

All week, we've been highlighting some of the winning performances from this year's Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow. Today, violin silver medalist Sergey Dogadin plays excerpts from the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto. And the grand prize-winner, pianist Daniil Trifonov, plays Franz Liszt's "La Campanella."

All week, we've been highlighting some of the winning performances from this year's Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow. Today, violin silver medalist Sergey Dogadin plays excerpts from the Tchaikovsky Violin Concerto. And the grand prize-winner, pianist Daniil Trifonov, plays Franz Liszt's "La Campanella."

Ernest Chausson was plagued by doubt and self-criticism. He was given to beating himself with his fists when he was unhappy with his composing. His perfectionism got in the way of him finishing anything. And yet, he wrote beautiful music. Claude Debussy was his friend, and encouraged him, saying "you don't let yourself go enough." The story of Ernest Chausson's odd life and puzzling death, plus a performance of his Concerto for Violin, Piano, and String Quartet from the Spoleto Festival USA.

The slow movement of Chopin's Second Piano Concerto is a passionate declaration of love by the smitten 19-year-old Chopin. Lang Lang was 12 when he first performed it. And what does a 12-year-old know about romance? Struggling to capture those emotions, so foreign to him, he asked his dad what to do. His advice: just think about the love you feel for your mom. The grown-up Lang Lang plays Chopin, in concert at the Concertgebouw.

Maurice Ravel was 31 when he began writing a piece that he called simply, "La Valse.""The Waltz." He was 45 when he finished it. In those 14 years, everything changed: Ravel, Europe, and the piece itself. It began as a light tribute to carefree Viennese waltzes. Ravel set the piece aside, then saw the agony of World War I firsthand. When he came back to his waltz, the world was very different place. He was a very different man. And La Valse was no longer a light tribute. In 13 minutes, you'll hear the waltz slowly go delirious, spin out of control, and finally, fly apart into chaos.

Most classical music concerts take place inside the concert hall, essentially a glorified box. Many of those boxes are rightly revered and cherished for their history, architecture, and acoustics. But today, we'll go outside the box. Today's show features performances from unusual locations, including a barge, a night club, and a former power plant.