Christopher Tignor is a composer, violinist, and software engineer. His emotionally charged scores and unique focus on live, performance-based electro-acoustic practice has won acclaim within both the classical and experimental communities.
Listen to a never-before-broadcast show theme song from the 1986 pilot episode of the program. Fred Child also interviews the show's first executive producer, Wes Horner, and Jim Pugh, composer of the Performance Today theme song.
Anthony McGill is principal clarinet with the New York Philharmonic. In this special online-only Puzzler, he joins Fred and Bruce Adolphe in the studio to take a crack at our weekly musical game.
Composer Justin Hurwitz talks about creating the themes that give the film La La Land an emotional, musical soul.
Listeners and radio hosts share stories about their favorite Christmas and winter songs.
From a young age, Sam Shepherd has rejected the idea of neat, tidy musical categories. He studied classical piano growing up, but felt confined by what he calls the "dots on a page." It wasn't until he heard a performer really making a classical piece his own, breaking out of strictly classical feel, that he was hooked. Now, Shepherd writes music under the alias "Floating Points."
Listen to the brass quartet The Westerlies perform original compositions from their album live in our studio.
Craig Hella Johnson for years thought about how to respond to the brutal death of Matthew Shepard in 1998. Music helped him cope with the event and that's when he realized this was a Passion story, like the ones composed by Bach, Mendelssohn and Penderecki. Eighteen years later, the vocal ensemble Conspirare brings this music to life.
Sir Neville Marriner, one of the stalwart legends of today's classical scene, passed away on Oct. 2, 2016. Recently, Fred spoke with Joshua Bell about Marriner's legacy.
Melody Parker loves to dance. When she wrote the music for her album "Archipelago," she didn't start with a catchy tune, or harmonies, or rhythm. She started with movement.
