Performance Today®

Every Friday beginning today, we'll feature a 21st century work, including interviews with the composer. Today, we'll hear the world premiere of "Visions from Another World," by Karim Al-Zand. JoAnn Falletta conducts Houston's River Oaks Chamber Orchestra in the performance. Al-Zand composed this whimsical work based on three different 19th century illustrations. You can view them by scrolling down to Today's Fredlines.

We're used to hearing Beethoven's Fifth Symphony come thundering at us from about a hundred musicians on stage. Today, we'll hear the work on a much smaller scale. The Chamber Orchestra of Europe, about half the size of a full symphony orchestra, tackles the Fifth, and brings out its more intimate side. Bernard Haitink conducts the performance, from a concert in Lucerne, Switzerland.

Belgium's KlaraFestival aims to get classical music out of the concert hall and into interesting new spaces, holding concerts in train stations, and even the Brussels International Airport. Today, we'll hear a performance from the 2008 KlaraFestival. The National Orchestra of Belgium performed Franz Schubert's Symphony No. 6 - not in an airport, but in a more conventional location, a concert hall in Brussels.

It was an unlikely chain of events that brought Igor Stravinsky and "The Firebird" together. The Ballet Russes first considered four other composers before turning, in desperation, to the young, unknown Stravinsky. The result was a masterpiece, and Stravinsky became an overnight star. Today we'll hear the Netherlands Symphony perform a suite from Stravinsky's ballet.

After we hear William Walton's musical evocation of this etching by Thomas Rowlandson, Fred Child sits down in our Maud Moon Weyerhaeuser Music Studio for a chat with pianist Rudolf Buchbinder. He's a lover of the live experience: Almost all of his recordings are from concerts. But he'll break with form by playing Schubert and Johann Strauss in the studio. Then we'll go to Amsterdam to hear him perform music from Brahms' Second Piano Concerto.

Amsterdam's Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra was recently ranked as the top orchestra in the world. And their home, the Concertgebouw, is widely regarded as the best concert hall in the world. Add to that mix conductor Mariss Jansons, whom some have called the best conductor in the world, and you've got an unbeatable combination. Today we'll hear the Royal Concertgebouw with Mariss Jansons at the Concertgebouw, playing Schubert's Symphony No. 3.

We'll have a Mozart symphony in each hour of today's show. In the first, we'll go to Amsterdam to hear Nikolaus Harnoncourt lead the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra in a stirring rendition of the "Haffner" Symphony. And, in our second hour, Hans Graf conducts the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra in a performance of Mozart's 25th Symphony in St. Paul.

The only way to get five of a kind in poker is to cheat. Today, we'll feature five different works by the Waltz King, Johann Strauss, Jr. Plus a suite from "Der Rosenkavalier," by Richard Strauss. No cheating, we swear. We've laid all our cards on the table, and they add up to one great New Year's Day show.

Does wine taste better when you're listening to classical music? A study by a Scottish scientist argued that it does. We decided to put this theory to the test in a special broadcast, a Performance Today music listening and wine tasting party. Jason Kallsen, founder and owner of Twin Cities Wine Education, provided some wine recommendations to accompany our playlist.