Classical Music Playlist, November 8, 2024What Tchaikovsky considered his best composition, and his final completed work whose premiere he conducted nine days before his death, the “Pathétique” Symphony No. 6 is today’s Midday Masterpiece.
Classical Music Playlist, August 2, 2024Well-crafted and demanding of the soloist (and featuring the unusual beginning of a minute-and-a-half piano solo), the popular Piano Concerto No. 2 by French composer Camille Saint-Saëns is today’s Midday Masterpiece.
Classical Music Playlist, August 1, 2024Composed after threatening Soviet critiques of his music, the Symphony No. 5 by Dmitri Shostakovich was a triumphant success and pleased Soviet officials, critics and the public and became his most popular symphony. It’s today's Midday Masterpiece.
Classical Music Playlist, July 31, 2024With subtle hints of ragtime and jazzy syncopation popular in 1931, the Symphony No. 2 by American composer Randall Thompson is today’s Midday Masterpiece.
Classical Music Playlist, July 30, 2024The short-lived arpeggione was similar to a guitar but played like a cello. Today, the cello usually takes its place in performances of Franz Schubert’s Sonata for Arpeggione and Piano. Cellist Yo Yo Ma plays it for today’s Midday Masterpiece.
Classical Music Playlist, July 29, 2024Inspired by his Scottish ancestry and the Scottish highlands and Hebrides Islands, London-born English composer Granville Bantock’s “Hebridean Symphony” is today's Midday Masterpiece.
Classical Music Playlist, July 26, 2024Called Mozart’s greatest piano concerto and performed on period instruments including a fortepiano, Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 24 in c-minor is today’s Midday Masterpiece.
Classical Music Playlist, July 25, 2024Beethoven’s only Violin Concerto premiered in 1806 but then languished for decades until Felix Mendelssohn conducted it in 1844, 17 years after Beethoven’s death. It’s today's Midday Masterpiece with American violinist Hilary Hahn.
Classical Music Playlist, July 24, 2024With its third movement that became a standalone hit, the full 1937 Symphony No. 2 by Swedish composer Lars-Erik Larsson is today's Midday Masterpiece.
Classical Music Playlist, July 23, 2024An elegant work of late French Romanticism, the 1905 Quintet for Piano, Oboe and String Trio by Théodore Dubois is today's Midday Masterpiece.
Classical Music Playlist, July 22, 2024Inspired by the landscape and folksongs of Ukraine where he composed the work, Tchaikovsky's Symphony No. 2 is today's Midday Masterpiece.
