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Pianist Gabriela Montero's Election Improv The outspoken pianist is a fearless improviser with a passion for politics. At a concert at Northwestern University, hear her make up a tune on the spot, contrasting the two major presidential candidates in a freewheeling, thoroughly American musical debate. |
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Requiem For Sandy: What Music Gets You Through?   In the midst of crisis, music can sometimes mitigate the pain and loss. From powerful pop songs and intimate string quartets to soaring symphonies or singer-songwriters, tell us what you're listening to in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy (and the stress of the election). |
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Storm Scores: Finding Poignant Reminders In Water-Damaged Music The studio of Baltimore Symphony Orchestra Music Director Marin Alsop was hit by Hurricane Sandy. When she conducts some water-damaged scores in the future, she'll have wrinkled reminders of the fragility of life and the redemptive power of music. |
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Fridays are funnier with a classical cartoon at noon, from Deceptive Cadence. |
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How Is The White House Like The Opera House?  Terrorism, worrying about China and immigration from Mexico — these sound like topics for Obama vs. Romney, but these pressing political issues have also found their way into today's opera houses. Watch excerpts from five contemporary operas that grapple with these hot potatoes head-on. |
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Symphonic Superstorms: A Puzzler Over centuries of nasty weather, composers have whipped up some impressive orchestral storms of their own. Put on your musical meteorologist cap to identify the symphonic tempests and their authors in this interactive puzzler, which shows low-pressure cells in the concert hall and the opera house. |
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Over the centuries, the durable music of J.S. Bach has withstood almost every type of makeover — sounding unscathed on anything from a banjo to a Japanese shamisen. Violinist Gidon Kremer's new album features fresh arrangements of the master's music and new works by 11 contemporary composers. |
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Composer Hans Werner Henze Remembered  Known for his lushly lyrical scores and a fierce opposition to the Nazism that shadowed his childhood, this major German composer died Saturday in Dresden at age 86. Watch an excerpt from his children's opera Pollicino and learn more about his wide-ranging artistic legacy. |
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Halloween Fright: Five Versions Of That Terrifying Toccata And Fugue  Many folks would call Bach's Toccata and Fugue in D minor the ultimate piece of scary music. With that in mind, we've dug around YouTube for five frightfully wild versions, from a hauntingly eerie version for glass harmonica to creepy goings-on on a toy piano. |
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Star-Studded 'Heiress' Considers A Woman's Worth A much-anticipated revival of The Heiress, a 1947 play based on the Henry James novella Washington Square, opens in New York on Thursday. It marks the Broadway debut of two young stars — Jessica Chastain, the Academy Award nominee from The Help, and Dan Stevens from the hit series Downton Abbey. |
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I Know What You Did Last Measure Fridays are funnier with a classical cartoon at noon, from Deceptive Cadence. |
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The Politicians In Opera Puzzler As election season sprints to the finish, take a detour to identify some operatic officeholders in an interactive political puzzler. Can you tell an emperor from a senator, a president from a king? Click, listen and test your knowledge of singing politicians. |
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Roomful Of Teeth: Experimental Singing, Smiles Guaranteed Hear this youthful group bring a 21st-century spin to a capella singing on their debut album, featuring new music by Merrill Garbus of tUnE-yArDs and other exciting contemporary composers. Their joyful sounds range from Mongolian throat singing to the Moonglows' doo-wop - in just one piece. |
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'Nixon In China': An American Opera Inches Toward Classic At 25 John Adams' first opera premiered 25 years ago today at Houston Grand Opera. Not only did Nixon in China bring recent history on stage, it ushered in a wave of operas based on contemporary personalities. Watch an excerpt of the original production, directed by Peter Sellars. |
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Stephen Hough's 'French Album,' A 'Musical Dessert Trolley' The concert pianist's latest album resulted from his study of what makes a piece of music uniquely French. |
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On The Bright Side, Unlimited Harp Music Fridays are funnier with a classical cartoon at noon, from Deceptive Cadence. |
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Indianapolis Symphony Returns, Seattle May Strike And Philly Reboots Another week of peaks and valleys - Indianapolis returns its symphony to the stage, a Cuban ensemble is visiting Pennsylvania and Seattle threatens to strike. Meanwhile, Philly Orchestra players offer to replace a child's missing trombone. It's all the classical music news that's fit to link. |
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Simone Dinnerstein's Bach Between The Notes Hear the celebrated Bach interpreter play the tranquil Partita No. 1 in the NPR studio. Dinnerstein - who burst onto the scene with a popular recording of the Goldberg Variations - phrases her Bach lovingly, taking great care to find the subtle gestures and and ideas in and around the notes. |
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Philadelphia Orchestra Reboots With New Music Director The world-renowned orchestra is revitalized with the addition of 37-year-old music director Yannick Nézet-Séguin. He brings a youthful energy to the organization, which is just coming out of bankruptcy. |
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Paintings, Including A Picasso, Taken From Museum Seven paintings were stolen this week from the Kunsthal museum in Rotterdam in the Netherlands. Steve Inskeep talks to Christopher Marinello, of Art Loss Registry, about the market for stolen art work. |
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Esa-Pekka Salonen's Excellent Violin Adventure The composer-conductor's award-winning Violin Concerto makes a stunning CD debut with violinist and McArthur "genius grant" fellow Leila Josefowicz. The exceptionally vivid music says farewell to the LA Philharmonic, which he led for 17 years and turned into a model of innovation. |
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Budapest Quartet Gets To The Heart Of Beethoven Among the most central pieces of the classical-music repertoire are the 16 string quartets Beethoven composed over the course of his career. For critic Lloyd Schwartz, these quartets, especially as recorded by the Budapest String Quartet, were crucial to his own musical upbringing. |
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Fridays are funnier with a cartoon at noon from Deceptive Cadence. |
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Masur And Levine On Parkinson's, Animating Wild Things And Shattering A Stereotype From around the classical internet, all the week's news that's fit to link. |
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Jonathan Biss: Schumann's Culture Of Musical Nostalgia The pianist explores the possibility that Robert Schumann was the first composer to infuse a longing for the past music in his own music. |
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During Lockout Season, Orchestra Musicians Grapple With Their Future American symphonies have just begun a new season - but many musicians around the country have yet to play a single note on stage. |
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Jonathan Biss: Meet The Schumanns (And Their Cryptic Communications) The pianist performs Robert Schumann's music and decodes musical messages of love to his wife Clara. |
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Jonathan Biss: Shooting Down The Schumann Detractors The acclaimed pianist performs music by Robert Schumann and defends the misunderstood composer's reputation. |
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5 Things You Never Knew About Schumann The author of a newly reissued Robert Schumann biography presents a guide to the misunderstood composer's life and music. |
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First Listen: 'REWORK_Philip Glass Remixed' Celebrate the composer's 75th birthday with 12 inventive remixes of his malleable work. Beck, Dan Deacon, Tyondai Braxton, Johann Johannsson, Pantha Du Prince and others reinterpret Glass' music, teasing out beauty and rhythm along the way. |
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The MacArthur 'Genius' Bow Maker Who Makes Violins Sing Over the past four decades, Benoit Rolland has made more than 1,400 bows for violins, violas and cellos. |
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Fridays are funnier with a classical cartoon at noon, from Deceptive Cadence. |
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(More) Lockouts, Lawsuits And Losses Minnesota goes to YouTube, classical "geniuses," and another fiddle seized at the airport: a roundup of all the classical news that's fit to link. |
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Carnegie Hall Live: The Chicago Symphony Performs 'Carmina Burana' Join us as Carnegie Hall opens its new season with a gala performance of Carl Orff's lusty, rowdy masterpiece featuring the CSO and Music Director Riccardo Muti. |
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Carnegie Hall Live: The Chicago Symphony Orchestra Performs 'Carmina Burana' Hear the opening concert of Carnegie Hall's new season with a gala performance of Carl Orff's lusty, rowdy masterpiece, featuring the CSO and music director Riccardo Muti. |
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Classical Lost And Found: Neglected Symphonies By A Great Dane The brilliant and rigorously built chamber symphonies by Vagn Holmboe have finally made it to disc. Love Nielsen? Give this other Danish composer a try. |
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Song Premiere: Beck Remixes Philip Glass With 'NYC: 73-78' The 20-minute track, from an upcoming collection of remixed Philip Glass tunes, celebrates the avant-garde composer's 75th birthday. |
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L.A. Phil Live: Gustavo Dudamel Conducts 'The Rite Of Spring' In Concert Nearly a century after its debut, the shock of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring remains. "It's like Stravinsky wrote the piece one week ago," says Los Angeles Philharmonic music director Gustavo Dudamel, who leads this iconic score and a world premiere by Pulitzer Prize winner Steven Stucky. |
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Leonard Bernstein's 'Kaddish' Symphony: A Crisis Of Faith Conductor Marian Alsop muses on her mentor's most religious symphony, a work that raises more questions than it answers. |
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Gustavo Dudamel On The Magic Of Stravinsky's 'Crazy Music' One of today's hottest conductors talks about a piece that's integral to his musical life: Stravinsky's earthshaking Rite of Spring, which Dudamel insists has not lost its power to shock in the century since it was written. |
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In Ohio, A Three-Way Musical Marriage Of Convenience After struggling with budget issues, the Dayton Philharmonic, Ballet and Opera banded together to form a single arts organization. |
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Carnegie Hall Live: The Chicago Symphony Performs 'Carmina Burana,' Oct. 3, 7 p.m. ET Join us as Carnegie Hall opens its new season with a gala performance of Carl Orff's lusty, rowdy masterpiece featuring the CSO and Music Director Riccardo Muti. |
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The Academy Of St. Martin In The Red Fridays are funnier with a classical cartoon at noon, from Deceptive Cadence. |
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Orchestra Strikes, The Winter Of 'Spring For Music' And A Fertile Face For Opera Updates on the troubles in Chicago, Atlanta and Minnesota: from across the classical internet, all the news that's fit to link. |
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Efterklang With Wordless Music Orchestra, Live In Concert The Danish art-rock trio takes the stage with the Wordless Music Orchestra at the Metropolitan Museum of Art for the American premiere of music from the band's new album Piramida. |
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Klaus Heymann: On 25 Years Of Naxos - And Changing The Classical Music Business The founder of Naxos has upended the classical music industry since starting his label 25 years ago. Hear the music he chose to tell the Naxos story. |
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The 2012 Gramophone Awards: Some Surprises, Lots Of (Repeated) Familiar Names From Calleja to Abbado to Grosvenor, read about and hear some of the winners from this year's highly prestigious awards ceremony, held today in London. |
 A Swiss foundation claims to have evidence of an earlier version. Skeptics say they need more proof. |
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A Young Pianist Triumphs In Music From The Young 20th Century With a new album, Polish pianist Rafa? Blechacz proves his multiple wins at the 2005 Chopin Competition were no fluke. |
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Glenn Gould: Beyond Bach's 'Goldberg Variations' Hear the iconic pianist play a wide range of music, from Brahms and Gibbons to Schoenberg and Strauss. |
