Performance Today®

One of the great joys of music festivals is hearing ad-hoc all-star groups who would never otherwise get to play together. We've got just such an ensemble on today's show, a unique all-star quartet plays music by Gabriel Faure at the Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festival on Long Island.

In 1967, Nino Rota wrote what is like Mount Everest for double bass players. It's daunting, dangerous, and tempting. On today's show, hear double bassist Stanislau Anishchanka and the West German Radio Symphony Orchestra scale the Divertimento Concertante by Nino Rota.

Tim Bradley recently arranged a piece by Clara Schumann for his group, the Copper Street Brass. Join us today to hear the Copper Street Brass play Bradley's arrangement of Soirees Musicales from a concert in St Paul, Minnesota.

Quartet San Francisco is dedicated to advancing the traditional string quartet structure into a new world of vibrant music. On today’s show, hear Quartet San Francisco play their version of Rhapsody in Blue.

The Symphonie Fantastique by Hector Berlioz tells a dark tale about a young artist and his obsessive love for the perfect woman...and this wild piece is, in many ways, autobiographical! It’s music powered by love, drugs, and obsession on this episode of Performance Today.

Tim Bradley recently arranged a piece by Clara Schumann for his group, the Copper Street Brass. Join us today to hear the Copper Street Brass play Bradley's arrangement of Soirees Musicales from a concert in St Paul, Minnesota.

Franz Schubert named a piano duet "Allegro in A minor.” Still, after Schubert died, a publisher thought it seemed to express something fundamental about the human condition and gave it the subtitle "Storms of Life." We'll hear that duet on today's show from a performance at the Skaneateles Festival in the Finger Lakes region of New York.

Pianist Jeremy Denk says Robert Schumann "…may not be so much a composer of pieces, as he is a composer of visions." In today's episode, join us to hear Jeremy Denk in concert, bringing to life the visions of Robert Schumann.

In the 1930s and 40s, composer Erich Korngold helped create the epic orchestral sound of Hollywood movies. He borrowed that sound from himself when he wrote his Concerto for Violin and Orchestra. We'll hear violinist James Ehnes and the Buffalo Philharmonic play Korngold’s concerto on today’s show.