Introducing YourClassical’s American Composers Countdown: the top American composers, as ranked by you. From now until June 23, use the form below to vote for your favorite American composers!

We’ll take the results and count them down on the air on Friday, July 3, to kick off the Fourth of July weekend.

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Conductor, composer and educator Michael Tilson Thomas, who led the San Francisco Symphony for 25 years, establishing its reputation as a world-class orchestra, died on Wednesday at his home in San Francisco, according to a statement from his publicist, Constance Shuman. He was 81 years old.

In 2021, Thomas announced that he was being treated for a brain tumor. In 2022, he acknowledged that he had been battling glioblastoma multiforme, an aggressive brain cancer.

Thomas held the position of music director at the San Francisco Symphony [SFS] from 1995 to 2020 and was by far the orchestra's longest-serving music director. He won 12 Grammy awards, and under his direction, SFS achieved a superb degree of technical and musical polish.

In a statement, Priscilla Geeslin, the chair of the symphony's board, said:

"When Michael Tilson Thomas was named Music Director of the San Francisco Symphony, I remember a feeling of pure exhilaration — as though something extraordinary had just been set in motion for all of us. What followed exceeded even that early excitement. On the podium, he brought brilliance, curiosity, and a singular voice that reshaped the orchestra. Off the podium, he revealed warmth, wit, and a generosity of spirit that made getting to know him as a friend an unexpected gift. Thomas didn't just lead the Symphony — he became part of the cultural fabric of San Francisco itself, expanding what it meant to be an orchestra in a city like ours. His impact reached far beyond the concert hall, touching the life of the city in ways both visible and deeply personal. And even after stepping down as Music Director, he never truly stepped away. He remained an integral part of the Symphony — artistically, intellectually, and as a guiding presence — continuing to shape and inspire the organization he helped define.

"We were, quite simply, so lucky to have him."

He was California-born and educated

Thomas, known throughout the classical world and beyond as MTT, was a man of vision, curiosity and enormous musical talent. He was born in Los Angeles on Dec. 21, 1944, into a theatrical family. His father was a stage manager turned movie and TV producer, while his paternal grandparents, Boris and Bessie Thomashefsky, were Yiddish theater stars. Thomas, an only child, started piano studies early and took up the oboe as well. His plans for a professional career as a pianist were ended by an injury. His oboe practice led him to a junior high orchestra, where, at the age of 12, he met 11-year-old cellist Joshua Robison, who became his friend and, years later, his life partner.

At the University of Southern California, he studied with composer Ingolf Dahl and took up conducting. During his time at USC, he worked with Igor Stravinsky and other important composers. Stravinsky and Aaron Copland became friends and mentors to him, as did Leonard Bernstein, whom Thomas met in his early 20s.

His first major appointment was as an assistant conductor at the Boston Symphony Orchestra [BSO] in 1969. William Steinberg was then the music director in Boston, and his poor health meant that Thomas conducted an unusually large number of concerts for an assistant conductor. He even took over for Steinberg mid-concert during a BSO visit to Lincoln Center. An October 1969 program included works by Joseph Haydn, Stravinsky, Charles Ives and Claude Debussy, composers of lifelong interest to Thomas.

His conducting career ranged from coast to coast

Thomas remained at the BSO until 1974 and appeared after that as a guest conductor. In 1971, he took the post of music director of the Buffalo Philharmonic, a position he held until 1979.

In the mid-1970s, Thomas was living in New York City when Robison, his childhood friend, contacted him through his sister, the noted flutist Paula Robison. By 1976, the friends had become life partners and Joshua, an educator, had also become Thomas' business partner and manager. At a time when gay people lacked legal protections and many stayed in the closet to survive, their relationship was never much of a secret. The couple married in 2014. Robison died on February 22, 2026, after having suffered a spinal cord injury the previous August. He and Thomas were partners for nearly 50 years.

Following Thomas' departure from the Buffalo Philharmonic, there were glimpses of the opera career that could have been: He conducted the U.S. premiere of the three-act version of Alban Berg's Lulu at Santa Fe Opera, and led staged productions at New York City Opera, Cardiff, Chicago, Amsterdam and Houston.

Lacking a permanent music director position through much of the 1980s, Thomas guest-conducted at major orchestras and festivals all over the U.S. and Europe, including a stint as principal guest conductor of the Los Angeles Philharmonic from 1981 to 1985.

In 1987, Thomas co-founded the New World Symphony (NWS) in Miami Beach. The NWS is a training orchestra offering fellowships to highly skilled musicians who are just starting their professional careers. Since its founding, more than a thousand musicians have participated in its programs, and a number of current and past members of the SFS were members of the NWS.

Patti Niemi, who's been a percussionist in the San Francisco Opera Orchestra since 1992, played with the NWS for its first four years, and commented on how important the orchestra is for young professionals. "When you finish music school, you're only trained to do one thing, and it's a race against time. You have a clock going because your full-time job is to practice, and nobody pays you for that. So to earn a living as a musician means taking time away from that practicing. He gave us a place to practice. We had a place not only to practice, but to do what we loved and get paid for it."

Thomas was instrumental in the creation of the New World Center, a Frank Gehry-designed campus that opened in 2011. Thomas was artistic director of the NWS until 2022, when he announced his battle with glioblastoma.

In 1988, Thomas became principal conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra (LSO). After his appointment as music director in San Francisco, he became the LSO's principal guest conductor and later, the London orchestra's conductor laureate.

Thomas also had a long connection with the Ojai Music Festival in California, a haven for new music. He first performed there as a pianist, in 1965, then served as music director seven times.

His 25-year tenure at the San Francisco Symphony transformed the institution

When Thomas arrived in San Francisco in 1995, he was no stranger to the orchestra: His first appearance with them had been in January 1974.

He succeeded Edo de Waart and Herbert Blomstedt, who had spent much of their tenures building SFS, and Thomas inherited an orchestra that had been well-schooled by his immediate predecessors. De Waart was committed to performing new music, and had brought composer John Adams to SFS in 1979 as the new music adviser and creator of the New and Unusual Music Series. Blomstedt was more focused on the core European repertory of the 18th through 20th centuries.

Peter Pastreich, who was CEO of SFS when Thomas was hired, noted that "We considered Michael for the job in 1985, when we chose Blomstedt, but he wasn't quite ready then, though we all knew he was a gigantic talent. By the time of our next search, he had matured, partly due to his experience as principal conductor of the London Symphony Orchestra, and he was clearly ready.

"After he was announced as our next Music Director, Michael asked me about his being openly gay. I told him I thought that would be an advantage, not a disadvantage, here, since San Francisco has a big and active gay community."

Thomas' first season made an explosive impact: He performed a work by an American composer on every program, including Henry Cowell, Carl Ruggles, John Adams, Irving Berlin and John Philip Sousa. Many of these names would appear again and again over the years; far less present were works by female or Black composers, or works by less accessible male American composers like Elliott Carter, Roger Sessions and Milton Babbitt, missing an opportunity to further expand the orchestra's repertory.

Asked about how the orchestra changed under Thomas, Pastreich said, "Under Michael, the orchestra's sound became more lyrical, and more flexible — both because of the new repertory he programmed, and his focus on the quality of the orchestra's sound. MTT knew the playing of every musician in the orchestra, and he always treated musicians with respect."

Thomas launched several projects that brought the orchestra to an audience far beyond San Francisco. He founded and narrated Keeping Score, a series of television and radio documentaries about famous composers and their works. The orchestra started its own recording label, SFS Media, in 2001 and regularly toured the United States, Europe and Asia. Thomas made more than 120 recordings with orchestras including the SFS, the London Symphony Orchestra and the Buffalo Philharmonic.

In 2017, Thomas announced his decision to retire from the SFS, citing a chance to begin "a new period of creative possibilities" as one goal, which was assumed to include more time spent composing. His own compositions appeared on his San Francisco programs over the years, but his work was also heard well outside California. In 1991, for example, UNICEF commissioned his work From the Diary of Anne Frank, featuring Audrey Hepburn as narrator.

In 2023, Thomas gave a number of farewell concerts with several of the orchestras with whom he was closely associated. Three concerts with the San Francisco Symphony in Jan. 2024, with the conductor leading performances of Mahler's Fifth Symphony, were billed as his final performances with his beloved ensemble. But he conducted for the last time at a belated 80th birthday celebration on April 26, 2025, two months after announcing that his brain tumor had recurred. His survivors include his sisters-in-law, the eminent flutist Paula Robison and Deborah Robison.

Copyright 2026, NPR

This National Poetry Month, join host Andrea Blain for Words and Music of Black America, a special featuring music with texts by Black poets. These works raise issues of civil rights, social justice, racial divides, and freedom in diverse and sometimes surprising ways. Listen now!

Playlist

• Jake Runestad: “Why the Caged Bird Sings” - Conspirare; Craig Hella Johnson, conductor

• Florence Price: “Sympathy” - Louise Toppin, soprano

• Valerie Coleman: Portraits of Langston: I. Prelude (Helen Keller) - Anthony McGill, clarinet; McHale Trio

• Langston Hughes: Portraits of Langston: Introduction No. 1 (“Helen Keller”) - Mahershala Ali, narrator

• Margaret Bonds: Three Dream Portraits: “I, Too” - Malcolm J. Merriweather, baritone

• Jessie Montgomery: Break Away - PUBLIQuartet

• Damien Geter: Cantata for a More Hopeful Tomorrow: “The Resolve” - Washington Chorus; Eugene Rogers, conductor

• Jeff Scott: Homage to Paradise Valley: IV. Paradise Theater Jump! - Akropolis Reed Quintet

• Marsha Music: The Valley, the Bottom, and Hastings Street: Pt. 1 “Long Ago but Not Forgotten” - Marsha Music, narrator

• Rosephanye Powell: “Still I Rise” - Twin Cities Women’s Choir; Mary Bussman, conductor

• Damien Sneed: “The Gift to Sing” - Lawrence Brownlee, tenor

• Margaret Bonds: “Credo” – Janinah Burnett, soprano; Dessoff Choirs; Malcolm J. Merriweather, conductor

• Bernice Johnson Reagon: “Beatitudes” - Sweet Honey in the Rock

• Richard Farina Arr. Will Liverman: “Birmingham Sunday” - Will Liverman, baritone

• Aaron Copland: Lincoln Portrait - Maya Angelou; Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra; Louis Langrée, conductor

• Joel Thompson: “Seven Last Words of the Unarmed” - Tyrese Byrd, soloist; EXIGENCE; Eugene Rogers, conductor

• John Stephens, Lonnie Lynn and Che Smith: Selma: “Glory” - LaVonte Heard, soloist; EXIGENCE; Eugene Rogers, conductor

• Regina Harris Baiocchi: Piano Poems - Sarah Cahill, piano

Join Steve Seel for an Easter celebration with the complete performance of George Frideric Handel's sacred oratorio Messiah, with the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. Led by conductor Dinis Sousa, an all-star roster of vocal soloists and the renowned vocal ensemble the Singers, led by Matthew Culloton, the concert was recorded live in December at the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts. Listen to the concert now!

Credits

Dinis Sousa, conductor

Liv Redpath, soprano

Aryeh Nussbaum Cohen, countertenor

Hugo Hymas, tenor

Ashley Riches, bass-baritone

The Singers — Minnesota Choral Artists, chorus

Matthew Culloton, artistic director

Find out more about the performance through the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra’s digital program book.

The Minnesota Orchestra announced Thursday that violinist and conductor Leonidas Kavakos has been appointed the orchestra’s principal guest conductor. “We are very happy to welcome Leonidas Kavakos into this new role,” Music Director Thomas Søndergård says. “He is an artist of great integrity and creativity who will bring conviction, passion and interesting projects to our Orchestra and audiences.”

Kavakos will begin his three-year appointment in 2027. Each season will feature Kavakos in three weeks of subscription concerts, including conducting the Minnesota Orchestra at least twice a season, plus additional appearances as a soloist or chamber musician.

Kavakos, who was born and raised in a musical family in Athens, Greece, has enjoyed a longtime connection to the Minnesota Orchestra, having made his debut with the orchestra in 1995. More recently, Kavakos performed as a soloist and conductor with the Minnesota Orchestra on October 10 and 11, 2025. During the concerts, Kavakos was the soloist on Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 3.

“I am thrilled to be joining the Minnesota Orchestra as its principal guest conductor,” Kavakos says. “As a young music student still forming a musical identity, I was deeply inspired by the Minnesota Orchestra’s recordings with the legendary Dimitri Mitropoulos. The Orchestra produces a sound of rare warmth and flexibility, an element that has impressed me since my debut as a soloist in the 1990s.

“As principal guest conductor,” Kavakos continues, “I am tremendously looking forward to working more in depth with this fantastic orchestra and creating powerful musical experiences for the city of Minneapolis.”

On Saturday, Jan. 31, the Minnesota Opera presents the world premiere of My Name is Florence, an opera about Florence Beatrice Price, the prolific American composer who made history as the first Black woman to have a symphony performed by a major U.S. orchestra. The opera, which was created through the Minnesota Opera’s New Works Initiative, was inspired by writings and correspondence unearthed in the backyard of Price’s family home.

Composed by B.E. Boykin to a libretto by Harrison David Rivers, the opera presents vignettes from Price’s life that bring into focus the impact of family, legacy, and the transformative power of a seat at the piano. With warmth and humor, My Name is Florence explores the complexities of identity, generational connection, and ultimately, the power of music to transform. It is a celebration of Price’s enduring legacy in music and a reclamation of the space she occupies within the American musical canon.

Listen to on-demand audio of the MN Opera’s Feb. 5 performance of ‘My Name is Florence’ with host Steve Staruch!

Explore 'My Name is Florence' with its cast

Soprano Deborah Nansteel (who sings the role of Granny), Flora Hawk (who sings the role of Florence Beatrice Price), and Arianna Rodriguez (who sings the role of Lo-Lo) joined host Steve Staruch in Minnesota Public Radio’s Maud Moon Weyerhaeuser studio to talk about this exciting world premiere. Listen to their conversation about this exciting production:

Find out more about the production on the MN Opera’s official site.

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In fair Verona, timeless love blooms and family feuds rage. The Montague and Capulet families have despised each other for generations, but their children only have eyes for each other. Charles Gounod’s evocative score captures Shakespeare’s enduring story of two star-crossed lovers who are willing to sacrifice everything to be together. Listen to the Minnesota Opera’s performance of Romeo and Juliet now!

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The concert band is a familiar part of many Americans' educational experience. Whether you played in the band, had friends who played, or simply knew of all the kids who headed to the far corner of the school at 10th period, you have probably heard of band and maybe some of its instruments.

But while you might know famous composers' names from throughout classical music history, you might be less familiar with band composers. Here are just a few of the important names in band history.

John Philip Sousa is, for many, the primary encounter with concert bands in the wild. He has been called the March King because he contributed more than 100 marches to the band literature. His The Stars and Stripes Forever is an American classic, and he was a powerful force in creating a concert band culture in the United States through the Marine Band and his touring band. As his music would suggest, Sousa was a fun-loving, patriotic guy. His band also played as a volunteer baseball team, challenging all of the local teams on their tours.

It should be noted that depending on when you participated in band, certain composers' names will stand out as favorites. This list aims to include voices who have impacted or are impacting the tradition of composition for band, and is not to be read as a list of the "top 10" composers. Art is subjective, after all! There are countless composers not mentioned here whose works are educational and longtime favorites for bands worldwide, including popular names in the field such as John Barnes Chance, Alfred Reed, Ron Nelson and Robert W. Smith.

What this list also highlights is an incredible need for diversity in published composers.

Percy Grainger (1882-1961)

This man was truly devoted to the wind band. An Australian by birth, Grainger was instrumental in revitalizing a worldwide interest in British folk music. He's famous for having hiked around Great Britain with an early recording device strapped to his back. He would walk into pubs, buy the locals a round of drinks and ask them to sing a song. He recorded these informal performances and then transcribed them directly onto sheet music, with all of the rhythmic bumps or off-key harmonies that were captured. The resulting collection of folk tunes became the band standard Lincolnshire Posy. His other notable works include Children's March: Over the Hills and Far Away and Colonial Song (aka Australian Up-Country Tune).

Alex Shapiro (1962- )

Alex Shapiro is a seriously accomplished composer whose band works often include electronic audio tracks as a layer of sound otherwise unachievable for an acoustic ensemble. She was trained at Juilliard and the Manhattan School of Music under Ursula Mamlok and John Corigliano, but left the East Coast to score a documentary in California. There, while composing for other films, her passion for activism took off, and she served on the board and as vice president of the Southern California ACLU and as president of the board of directors of the American Composers Forum. She composes for a variety of instrumentations and ensembles, and is passionate about achieving greater composer diversity in the band world.

Karel Husa (1921-2016)

Husa's breadth of work covers everything from ballet to chamber music to vocal and orchestral works, and he won the 1969 Pulitzer Prize for his String Quartet No. 3. But his most famous work was for concert band. Music for Prague 1968 was written after the Czech-born composer listened to a BBC Radio broadcast as the Soviet Union crushed the Prague Spring movement. Husa had since emigrated to the United States, but as he listened to the report of the event, he was deeply moved. Much of his work was influenced by other modern Czech composers, and Prague was only his second work for band, so he decided he would write it the same way he would compose for an orchestra. That decision was revolutionary, and the composer's embrace of the band as an ensemble that could achieve great professional musicality was as important in the 1960s as it is today.

Joseph Schwantner (1943- )

Between Husa and Schwantner, concert band writing became a serious artistic force in the late 20th century. Schwantner's … and the mountains rising nowhere revitalized the possibilities of band tonality and texture. He applied progressive motivic development, aleatoric writing effects and massive use of the percussion section (46 different instruments!) to create a standard for advanced ensembles. His other works for concert band are also highly regarded and include From a Dark Millennium, In evening's stillness … and Luminosity.

Julius Fucik (1872-1916)

Known as the "Bohemian Sousa," Fucik wrote extensively for concert band, which at the time meant a lot of military marches. He was a Czech composer and studied under Antonin Dvorak before becoming the conductor of several regimental bands and later his personal ensemble. In addition to hundreds of marches, he wrote polkas and waltzes. He combined styles, too, as heard in his famous Florentiner March. His other well-known piece is the Entry of the Gladiators, which became synonymous with circus clowns.

David Maslanka (1943-2017)

Maslanka was one of the biggest names in American composition — especially for band. His love of Bach contributed to a sound that is distinctly his own, with massive brass power chords and wild woodwind flurries, as well as simply mournful, poignant solo lines showing up in nearly all of his work. He wrote 10 symphonies, eight of which were for concert band, and more than 40 other pieces for concert band, as well as chamber, orchestral and solo works. Some of his most notable pieces include Mother Earth, Give Us This Day, Symphony No. 4 and countless others. His piece Angel of Mercy earned him an honorary doctorate from St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minn.

Vincent Persichetti (1915-1987)

The works of Persichetti, who has 14 classics in the band repertoire to his name, are often a band student's first introduction to contemporary classical music. As a composition professor at Juilliard, he taught Philip Glass, Toshi Ichiyanagi, Einojuhani Rautavaara and other contemporary composers. He first explored the styles of Bela Bartok, Igor Stravinsky and Aaron Copland before developing his own voice. His Divertimento, Symphony No. 6 and A Lincoln Address are among his most notable works.

Julie Giroux (1961- )

Giroux is an incredibly well-rounded powerhouse composer. Her first work was published when she was only 9, and she hasn't stopped since. An established band composer even in college, she moved to Los Angeles and within three hours was hired by Bill Conti to orchestra his score for the TV miniseries North and South. When she won her first of three Emmys, she was the first woman and youngest person to win the award. She has more than 100 film, video game and TV credits. But for the concert hall, she has composed more works for band than any other instrumentation. She is a highly sought-after guest clinician and advocate for school bands.

Gustav Holst (1874-1934)

Holst's First and Second Suites are staples in the band repertoire. His British background is an audible influence in his work, and he was a part of England's folk-song revival, which influenced a great deal of band music. A trombonist, pianist, music educator and composer, he was a believer in music for the people. Additionally, his is some of the best writing for the euphonium, a typically band-only instrument that he also employed in his most famous orchestral work, The Planets. His daughter, Imogen Holst (1907-1984), became a strong conductor, educator and composer, too, and advocated for her father's work.

Frank Ticheli (1958- )

It is hard to find a band student within the past 20 years who made it through the experience without playing something by Ticheli. His works are influential to young musicians because he treats the young band like a serious musical force. His music pushes students to work on blend, intonation and phrasing in a way that many composers disregard as impossible. His arrangements of American folk songs in concert settings are especially popular in schools. His notable works include Shenandoah, Blue Shades, Cajun Folk Songs,, Vesuvius and Angels in the Architecture.

Bonus: Frederick Fennell (1914-2004)

We would be remiss not to mention the Eastman Wind Ensemble's founder and inventor of the modern wind ensemble. Fennell decided to decrease the concert band's size for a clearer and more controlled sound, reducing each instrument's numbers to its orchestral size (one performer per part) while retaining the full band scoring. To promote the new group, he sent out a call for scores, to which Vincent Persichetti, Ralph Vaughan Williams and Percy Grainger quickly responded. Like his Tanglewood classmate Leonard Bernstein, Fennell is responsible for producing many recordings that have been used as the standard for decades, including a now-legendary series for Mercury Living Presence. He was a sought-after guest conductor for the world's finest bands, including the Dallas Winds, and was the founding director of the Tokyo Kosei Wind Orchestra, which is generally regarded to be the best band in the world.

Honorable Mention: Paul Hindemith (1895-1963)

Finally, an honorable mention goes to Paul Hindemith. He composed two cornerstone pieces of the band repertoire were composed by Hindemith: his Symphony in B-flat and his Symphonic Metamorphosis, which was an arrangement of his orchestral work based on the music of Carl Maria von Weber.

Ella Harpstead is a former classical intern for American Public Media and Minnesota Public Radio who is majoring in music composition at St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minn. She's also the pep band director and a leader of Musika Nova, and has served as euphonium section leader in the St. Olaf Band and as a director of the school's Valhalla Band.

A Grammy nomination is nothing new for conductor Gustavo Dudamel.

The music director designate of the New York Philharmonic, who is currently concluding his 17-year-tenure as music and artistic director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, has won seven Grammys over the course of his career. This year alone, he's nominated in three separate categories. But for the first time, one of those nominations is with an orchestra born from the musical system that raised Dudamel and launched his career: the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra (SBSO).

The orchestra is the flagship ensemble of Venezuela's world-renowned music education program, commonly known as El Sistema. For decades, El Sistema has promoted classical music as a vehicle for social change and development, providing free and rigorous training to more than a million children across Venezuela, according to their own figures. It has inspired similar models and dozens of member organizations in other countries. In recent years, El Sistema has also sparked backlash for its close relationship with the Venezuelan government, which faces an unprecedented and unpredictable path forward following the recent ousting of autocratic president Nicolás Maduro by U.S. forces.

Last spring, SBSO and Dudamel celebrated El Sistema's 50th anniversary with a European tour and a recording of Ravel's Boléro, which earned a Grammy nomination for best orchestral performance. The recognition from the Recording Academy may coincide with a turbulent moment for Venezuela, but Eduardo Méndez, who has served as executive director of El Sistema since 2008, says his focus is always on the music.

"This nomination, it's more than being a good recording or a beautiful recording," Méndez tells NPR. "It's really a sign of what Venezuela can do. This is the important thing — that we can see in our future how beautiful we can be and how good Venezuelans can be. We can do marvelous things."

From a garage to an international powerhouse 

El Sistema began in a parking garage in 1975 with less than a dozen students. Under the leadership of maestro José Antonio Abreu, a musician and economist, it grew into a government-funded social program aiming to create a culture of musical excellence throughout Venezuela. El Sistema established a network of youth orchestras across every single state, with a particular focus on underprivileged areas.

Méndez remembers his mom taking him to the local núcleo, or teaching center, in his hometown of Merida in 1983, when he was only 5 years old. "I started going and I never stopped," he says. "I still go to the núcleo every day."

He played violin in the local youth orchestra through his teen years and stayed deeply connected to the program even as he pursued a law degree. After graduation, Abreu mentored Méndez on how to run El Sistema and take over as his successor. Méndez's story, though unique for his industry, is similar to that of many SBSO musicians. Originally the program's flagship youth orchestra, SBSO has since expanded into a professional adult ensemble, made up entirely of musicians trained by El Sistema.

SBSO violinist Pathrycia Mendonça says she was basically born into the program; she started going to a núcleo in Barquisimeto as a small child, following the footsteps of her older sister. "It's not just coming to rehearsal and sitting and playing and [leaving]," Mendonça tells NPR. "We literally are like a family. We grow up together. We have a lot of time together. I think that that is the secret."

Carlos Chirinos-Espin, professor of music innovation and social development at New York University, says El Sistema's sense of belonging is key to the Simón Bolívar Symphony Orchestra's sound. He remembers throwing a party for SBSO's debut performance in London in 2007, and watching the musicians blasting reggaeton and dancing together afterwards.

"This Venezuelan orchestra, they hang out. They go to the bar. They eat together. They perhaps live in the same area," he says. "They have developed friendships because of the El Sistema model of education. The pedagogy and approach to building a community definitely has an impact on the quality of the performance itself. The Simón Bolívar Orchestra is proof of that."

That bond, Chirinos-Espin says, remains even as the members of the orchestra have changed over time. Dudamel, who serves as musical director of SBSO, grew from conductor prodigy of the youth orchestra into perhaps the most famous Venezuelan musician in the world, reaching bonafide rock star status in the classical music scene. Chirinos-Espin notes that while the curly-haired conductor's ascent has been the most notable and well-documented, there are plenty of other alumni who've reached prestigious positions thanks to El Sistema's training, including conductors Rafael Payare (Montreal Symphony Orchestra/San Diego Symphony), Diego Matheuz (Seiji Ozawa Music Academy Orchestra in Tokyo) and Domingo Hindoyan (Royal Liverpool Philharmonic Orchestra).

Controversies and clashes with the government 

Yet for all the international acclaim for both the orchestra's performances and its educational backbone, El Sistema and SBSO have also faced controversies, including allegations of sexual abuse within its ranks. Most recently, several former students spoke out on social media in 2021, detailing accounts of sexual harassment during their time in El Sistema; the independent outlet Caracas Chronicles then interviewed several alleged victims using pseudonyms to protect their identities. Once the allegations came to light, El Sistema issued a statement on X expressing "absolute solidarity with the victims and their families" and promising to investigate complaints and enhance prevention protocols.

El Sistema has long been largely funded by the government, dating back to its earliest mission of arming children with leadership and social skills through community-oriented music programs. But as late President Hugo Chávez and his successor, Maduro, consolidated power, El Sistema shifted from the jurisdiction of several social ministries to the president's office. Although the orchestra identifies as apolitical, Abreu and Dudamel were often pictured alongside government leaders; Dudamel performed with the orchestra at Chavez's funeral in 2013. Some critics — including Venezuelan pianist Gabriela Montero — have accused El Sistema of serving as a propaganda tool, pushing a positive image of Venezuela even as the government faced growing accusations of authoritarianism and human rights violations.

When asked about these criticisms, Méndez would only say that his job is to put the students first and keep the educational program alive.

"We have a mission. The mission is to spread classical music, to give access [to] classical music to every child and every youth in the country and perhaps in the world," he says. "We can't stop. If you stop, you lose the children. Education can't stop. [The children] have to take two or three buses a day to get to a núcleo, but they go every day. So if they go, we have to be there to teach."

As the country's socioeconomic crisis deepened over the past decade, forcing approximately a quarter of its population to flee, a sharp dissonance came into focus: on one side, there was a social program promising to help disadvantaged youth out of poverty through the power of music. On the other, a country with crumbling infrastructure that left those same children with few prospects for their future. This is perhaps most clearly illustrated in Marianela Maldonado's documentary Children of Las Brisas, which followed the lives of three El Sistema students over nearly a decade, and captured their increasing desperation under the weight of Venezuela's conditions.

One of those musicians, Wuilly Arteaga, became a prominent face of anti-government protests in 2017, playing his violin in front of armed soldiers (later he wrote of being jailed and tortured, and was ultimately forced into exile). Around that same time, the Venezuelan National Guard killed an 18-year-old El Sistema violist named Armando Cañizales at an anti-government demonstration. The next day, Dudamel penned a statement condemning the ongoing violence, marking his first time publicly weighing in on Venezuela's political repression.

"I urgently call on the President of the Republic and the national government to rectify and listen to the voice of the Venezuelan people. Times cannot be defined by the blood of our people," he wrote. "We owe our youth a hopeful world, a country where we can walk freely in dissent, in respect, in tolerance, in dialogue and in which dreams have room to build the Venezuela we all yearn for."

He followed the letter with an op-ed in the New York Times, calling Maduro's plans to form a new legislative body and take power away from the opposition-led National Assembly "unconstitutional." Soon after, Maduro canceled the National Youth Orchestra's planned U.S. tour. The future of El Sistema and its touring orchestras hung in the interim.

"Many of us had doubts after 2017. I had doubts," Chirinos-Espin says. "Is El Sistema going to continue to be what it was? Is that legacy going to continue? Because they didn't tour and I wasn't able to go to Venezuela; I wasn't able to see."

After Abreu's death in 2018, the National Youth Symphony Orchestra and musicians from SBSO participated in two tribute concerts in Chile for El Sistema's founder. Following the COVID-19 pandemic, SBSO did not embark on another major international tour until its residency at the Edinburgh International Festival in 2023, followed by performances across Asia.

A triumphant return

Méndez acknowledges that running El Sistema with the political and social backdrop of recent years has been challenging.

"It doesn't matter what happens outside, we are always focused on what we are doing," he says. "What we have done is keep the energy focused on positive things and on connecting classical music to the people. That's why we have been very motivated, all of us — the musicians, the staff, the management, everyone — because we really believe that what we are doing is helping the development of the country."

In 2025, months after a widely-contested presidential election in which Maduro declared himself the winner without presenting evidence of a victory, SBSO's 50th anniversary tour began. The January dates across Europe overlapped with the start of Maduro's new term, leading to allegations from pianist Gabriela Montero that SBSO was "music-washing" a stolen election. Though she encouraged music promoters and artists to boycott the tour, the European performances continued as planned.

SBSO violinist Pathrycia Mendonça says that in every city, Venezuelan flags and chants filled orchestra halls. International audiences and a growing Venezuelan diaspora abroad welcomed the orchestra night after night. Back in 2007, members of the youth orchestra had given their brightly colored jackets, donning the Venezuelan flag, to audience members after their London performances. Nearly 20 years later, Mendonça says fans came to return those jackets to the new musicians who are now a part of SBSO.

"It was crazy for us in London," she laughs. "I think it was a public that was waiting for our sound."

It was in that same city that SBSO recorded their now Grammy-nominated rendition of Ravel's Boléro. Mendonça says the composition reflects the orchestra's history and legacy. "For me, the piece represents what El Sistema means," she explains. "It's discipline, it's order, it's structure — but it's a feeling and a commitment [of] growing up as a country. For me, it's very special."

In a statement shared with NPR, Dudamel agreed. "It was a joy to bring our Sistema soul to Boléro — one of the most iconic works, not just in classical music, but in all of music — infusing it with our unique DNA of how we conceive sound, and how we approach music-making," he wrote.

SBSO's North American dates proved to be trickier. The orchestra's Los Angeles performances, scheduled to take place at the Hollywood Bowl over the summer, were canceled due to "travel complications." (Venezuela is one of the countries on President Trump's latest travel ban). The show continued elsewhere. In August, SBSO returned to London to perform a 10-night run at Wembley Stadium with Coldplay.

"They [were] all wearing black suits and white trainers a la Dudamel. They [were] often not reading the charts; they [were] looking at the other musicians and at the conductor," says Chirinos-Espin, who watched the performances. "I think in 2025, they proved that they are not only as good as they were before, but perhaps even better."

Chirinos-Espin largely credits Méndez's leadership for that growth, and for his ability to keep the orchestra playing and breaking new ground even in the face of Venezuela's humanitarian crisis. For his part, the executive director says the Grammy nomination and Coldplay shows signal what's to come for El Sistema's next five decades.

"It's really the beginning of a new era," Méndez says. "What we achieve now is like a trampoline; we are taking that impulse to advance and to go ahead."

Copyright 2026, NPR

You may not know his name, but Jim Self was John Williams' favorite tuba player for more than 25 years. Jim Self played the tuba on scores for Jurassic Park and Home Alone, and most notably, Close Encounters of the Third Kind: It was Jim Self’s performance that was featured as the voice of the Mother Ship.

Self, who died Sunday at the age of 82, played tuba on more than 1,500 soundtracks, including almost all the big John Williams soundtracks (although not on Jaws with its big tuba solo; that piece was performed by Tommy Johnson).

Beyond his work in film, Self recorded albums of classical music, performed in orchestras around Los Angeles. He was a teacher, he was a jazz musician, and one of the greats. Listen to more about Jim Self — including his recording of a piece by Robert Schumann — using the audio player above.

Sometimes you listen to a piece of music, and it transports you to a different place. Composer Jonathan Cziner’s latest work does exactly that.  

A Juilliard-educated composer working in Dallas, Texas, Cziner is also the artistic director of Voices of Change, a new music initiative that champions the work of living composers. He has long held a connection to Minnesota through performances of his music by the Minnesota Orchestra and has been a collaborator with the Lakes Area Music Festival in Brainerd, Minnesota.  

His newest piece, North Long Lake, MN, recently premiered at the Lakes Area Music Festival. It is inspired by its eponymous location and is dedicated to two special members of that community.    

Cziner wrote the piece for Don Bennett, one of the board members of the Lakes Area Music Festival, who lost his wife Mary Anne Bennett last summer. “She was one of the driving forces of the festival,” Cziner says, “and I wanted to write a piece dedicated to her memory.”  

North Long Lake, MN centers the Bennett's’ relationship and their love of the lake. “It is a character portrait of a person, and a tone painting of the lake,” Cziner says. “It’s about encapsulating both of those things.”  

The piece is a nuanced and layered representation of place and people, and Cziner asserts it comes from the heart. “In some inexplicable way, there’s something very special about this particular place in Minnesota that was very inspiring,” he says.  

The connection of the music to that place is right in the title, of course, but Cziner also created musical representations for Don and Mary Anne, and for the lake.   

To do this, Cziner devised a special musical alphabet to attach certain notes to Don’s and Mary Anne’s initials and to North Long Lake, so the presence of their relationship to each other and to the water can be heard in the musical passages. By composing in this way, Cziner hopes audiences who hear North Long Lake, MN can feel a sense of place while listening.   

In his compositions, deliberate strides of musical expression stem from a deep appreciation for the way the music can convey feeling to his audience. “Contemporary music doesn’t have to be a scary, esoteric thing,” Cziner says. He believes “part of being a living composer allows us to go into communities and communicate with people.” That connection with the world allows his music to speak widely across sets of people, meeting them where they are.   

Accessibility is one of the pillars of Cziner’s music, where he takes lived experiences of the everyday and writes them into works anyone can feel connected to. Nostalgia is a huge center of many of his compositions, thinking about places and memories as a way to channel musical meaning.   

The physicality and transience of the world are also huge themes across Cziner’s music. “We’re transient, we’re mortal, we’re not perfect, and that’s a pretty deep thing,” he says. "I think what’s so moving about it is being able to take that idea that’s terrifying and make something beautiful out of it…Some things can be very physical.”  

Cziner thinks there’s a pressure that comes with composing now where every artist feels like they have to find “their voice,” completely different from everyone else’s. This way of thinking makes the act of trying to create something more difficult than it already is, but Cziner has a way to work around this: “I find that my voice, whatever that may be, comes through in me being me, and the music I love to write,” he says. “It’s important for me to push myself, and try something new as an artist, but still stay true to what I love.”  

True to his artistic direction, Cziner thinks about what the audience will take away. Just before the premiere of North Long Lake, MN, he said he was most excited to be at the Lakes Area Music Festival with its community members to experience the music together.   

“That,” he said, “will be the coolest part of it.”  

Movies and music are inextricably linked — think Star Wars, or Psycho, or Ennio Morricone’s spaghetti westerns. Music helps tell the story you’re seeing onscreen.

Even more so with a silent film, in which most dialogue is inferred. Accompanying and dramatizing a silent movie with live, original music is somewhat of a lost art, but Katie Condon is keeping this niche tradition alive.

Condon, an accomplished Twin Cities musician and educator who is also Education Project Manager at YourClassical MPR, composes and performs the accompaniment for silent films in screenings around the metro area. It’s been the ideal means to meld her love of both art forms.

That love started early, growing up in Watertown, Minnesota, on the far western fringe of the Twin Cities metro area. “I just loved music as a child — I always gravitated toward it, it was always on in the house,” Condon said. She started playing piano in elementary school and took up percussion in middle and high school. But there was another influencing factor.

“My mom owned the video store, so I worked there starting as a young teenager,” Condon said, which fostered her fondness for cinematic scores. “I’d put the monitor on and pick [movies] with good music — that started my love of movies and movie music.”

After earning a piano performance degree from the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul and a masters degree in musicology from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois, she found herself drawn to the cinema — particularly, the now-defunct Oak Street Cinema, which fed on its proximity to the University of Minnesota campus to concentrate on unconventional programming, including silent films with live scores.

“I remember seeing the late, great Butch Thompson and [A Prairie Home Companion pianist] Rich Dworsky do it, and I just thought, ‘I want to do that, I think I can do that,’ ” Condon said. “I just had a sense it would be something that I could do.”

Fortuitously, her sister was a programmer at Oak Street. “I talked her into letting me try it. [She] did, and that was it.” Condon performed there for the first time in 2006. After taking a roughly 10-year break — “My career was pretty busy, and I had other musical outlets” — she picked it up again. “I kind of reached a point of, where do I want to put my performance and composing energy?”

And it does involve energy. When Condon gets sent a copy of a film, usually several months ahead of a screening, she prepares rigorously and builds up her stamina to be able to play constantly for the entire runtime.

“I’ll watch it as an audience member, a spectator, and usually take notes,” she said. “What I’m looking for is the general tone of the movie, the feel, key characters, and the structure.”

She diagrams the movie into chunks, deciding on a theme or sketch for each section. “I let the scenes play and mess around with some ideas” with her laptop at the piano, she said. For a typical 90- to 120-minute movie, she creates between 8 and 15 musical themes.

“I’ve learned to look for key moments, a dramatic arc, something very specific,” Condon said. “Sometimes I just vamp on a theme; it’s not note for note.” She emphasized that besides playing the music, she keeps her eyes on the screen to make sure the music is synchronized with the action.

“Katie’s scores are incredible,” said Peter Schilling, who runs the “Syncopated Silents” program at Twin Cities-area venues including the Heights Theater in Columbia Heights. “I can’t imagine how long it takes her to compose them, and how many times she watches each film, and individual scenes in each film, to get the score just right.

Condon mainly uses the piano for her scores, but for The Fire Brigade, a 1926 film with two scenes shot in two-color Technicolor, she decided percussion was necessary. “It is an over-the-top melodrama,” Condon explains. “The effects of the hand-colored orange flames, long before color, made it really fun to get to elevate what maybe would have been a forgettable movie otherwise, to capitalize on some of these things that make people take another look.”

“Though I love all of her scores,” Schilling acknowledges, “I was most impressed by the one for The Fire Brigade,” screened in 2022 at the Heights. “I found [the film] pretty mediocre, but I was so stunned by her score — there were two mostly, if not entirely, percussion sections during two tense scenes that totally changed the film.”

Condon also applied this multi-instrument approach to Haxan, a 1922 Scandinavian film that is acknowledged as the first horror movie. “There was an unpleasant torture scene, so too much melody didn’t seem right,” she said. “I used autoharp, just sound effects. I used to do more of that – then I challenged myself to do more on piano.

“I do like bringing in other sounds” than piano, she said. “But you want it not to sound too disjointed, to take too much attention away from the movie. I love the fact that the movie is the main attraction.”

John Moret, a programmer at Trylon Cinema in Minneapolis, recalls a time when piano played a big part in Condon’s performance, although it was an unconventional application of the instrument.

“My first time watching Katie Condon perform was an accompaniment she wrote and performed to a new restoration of Fritz Lang's Destiny,” he said. “It was a stunning experience. The film changes landscapes regularly and Katie had written different themes for each one.

“At one point, I remember her standing up and opening the top cabinet to pluck at the piano strings inside. It was incredible.”

Bringing new life to forgotten films is a particular delight for Condon. “There are some that re-released because they were lost and rediscovered, or represent the advancement of the time,” such as the Technicolor of The Fire Brigade.

And she often finds herself in discovery mode. “Generally, when these movies are offered to me, I don’t know about them in advance,” Condon said. “I know tons about movies from the 1990s, but not very much about silent film as a genre. I’m getting to be exposed to fantastic movies I wouldn’t have known about, and [I’ve] become very attached to characters.”

One such experience occurred at Trylon Cinema last November, when she accompanied 1929’s Pavement Butterfly, starring the iconic Anna May Wong. “She was just magnetic,” Condon said. “I’d never seen one of her movies, but I just loved the challenge of trying to portray her character and everything that happened to her character.”

Audiences respond powerfully to that dedication. “People came out of Katie’s performance [for The Fire Brigade] stunned,” Schilling said. “A few said it was the best silent film they’d ever seen.

“She really goes into the emotion onscreen and matches that with her music.”

Next up for Condon is an action-packed weekend July 25 to 27, playing at both the Heights and Trylon. She’ll accompany three screenings of Get Your Man, from pioneering filmmaker Dorothy Arzner, on July 25 and 26 at the Trylon, and the gender-bending classic Beverly of Graustark on July 27 at the Heights.

“At the Trylon,” Moret says, “we do our best to show cinema in all of its forms and silent films are the foundation that all other films are built on.

“Katie is exceptional at capturing the emotions that are happening in the films. Sometimes, watching a silent film can be a bit like encountering a foreign language, and what Katie does is translate the story and tenor for an audience that might otherwise be kept at arm’s length.”

Event info
What: Katie Condon accompanies Get Your Man (1927), starring Clara Bow and directed by Dorothy Arzner, and Beverly of Graustark (1926), starring Marion Davies.

When and where: Get Your Man, 7 p.m. July 25-26, 3 p.m. July 27, Trylon Cinema, 2820 E. 33rd St., Minneapolis; Beverly of Graustark, 7:30 p.m. July 27, Heights Theater, 3951 Central Ave. NE, Columbia Heights.

Tickets: $12, Trylon; $20, Heights

The Minnesota Orchestra has appointed Isaac Thompson as its next president and CEO. A Twin Cities native and Mounds View High School graduate, Thompson currently serves in the same role at the Oregon Symphony and will step into his new position in Minneapolis on Oct. 14.

Thompson’s appointment was announced Friday by board chair Nancy Lindahl, who cited his “bold, entrepreneurial spirit” and commitment to connecting orchestral music with broader civic life. The selection followed a national search and was led by a 14-member committee representing board, staff and musicians.

In addition to his extensive resume in orchestral leadership — including prior roles at the New York Philharmonic, Cincinnati Symphony and Milwaukee Symphony — Thompson serves on the boards of the League of American Orchestras and Minnesota Public Radio, where he is a trustee.

Listen to the interview using the audio player above, and find a transcript below.

Interview Transcript

Isaac Thompson: This appointment is deeply personal. I grew up in the Twin Cities, grew up in Shoreview, went to Mounds View High School. But my memories of music really go back to early childhood. My parents are longtime subscribers to the Minnesota Orchestra, and they took me as a young kid, and I still remember distinctly one of my first concert experiences, and I saw Jorja Fleezanis, the former concertmaster, walk out on stage with her incredible style. And from that moment, I said, "I want to play with the violin." It was really the Minnesota Orchestra that was the kind of catalyst for my interest in symphonic music. So it's deeply meaningful to be returning at this point.

Tom Crann: Tell me about the Minnesota Orchestra as as an association, as an organization. What do you think it does well in this space?

Isaac Thompson: The quality of the orchestra is remarkable, and it has been remarkable for generations. I think what I'm excited about is how the Minnesota Orchestra, in recent years, has really developed a deep connection to the community in [its] programming, in the ways in which orchestra musicians have really reached out into various aspects of the community. And I look forward to continuing that work and deepening the connection of the Minnesota Orchestra, not only to the Twin Cities, but to the rest of the state. 

Tom Crann: There's been a report of almost a $4 million deficit for the Minnesota Orchestra in the last year. Budget deficits in the last five of the six years previous. Tell me about the financial health of this orchestra in times that are challenging for the arts for any number of reasons. 

Isaac Thompson: You know, I think with the pandemic, looking back a few years ago, there still is a moment of rebuilding — rebuilding audiences, rebuilding audience behaviors, getting people back to the hall. I think the Minnesota Orchestra has done a terrific job of really getting people back to the hall. I think the audience is there, and now we really have to work on that philanthropic aspect of the work that we do. This is such an important institution, artistically to the community, it needs to be preserved, and we all need to work together to make sure that it is financially resilient and sustainable into the future.

Tom Crann: OK, how do you do that?

Isaac Thompson: Well, it's going to be, you know, definitely aggressive fundraising. It's going to be building relationships with key funders in the community. It's going to be certainly looking at different ways we can innovate our business model, and different ways we can diversify revenue streams. So it's not just one thing that is going to solve, kind of the overall question of financial resiliency. It's going to be a whole array of different levers that need to be pulled.

Tom Crann: A lot of talk, a lot of attention on making the orchestra experience more inclusive, however we define that. So whether that's race, ethnicity, age — a lot of orchestras have been talking about it. Who's actually doing it, and how do you do it?

Isaac Thompson: I think about kind of equity and access. I really double down on the access part of it. It's how do we, as an institution, the Minnesota Orchestra, create a point of entry for every single person in the community to engage with great art and great music? And I'm reminded of the conductor Gustavo Dudamel, who I had the privilege of working with in New York. He believes music is a fundamental human right. Bringing that into what we do as an institution at the Minnesota Orchestra is so important.

Tom Crann: There's an interview online I saw recently with the English conductor Simon Rattle, and he was talking about the composer Haydn. And he said Haydn's music is underrated, and it makes him happy he's alive. And I thought, wow, what music makes you happy you're alive?

Isaac Thompson: I have recently gone through a Schubert phase. You know, it's just, it's a miracle that this composer, who really lived only into his early 30s, had such an amazing output and such a deeply personal output. That is music that certainly makes me happy to be alive.

Tom Crann: Isaac Thompson, a native Minnesotan who has been chosen to be the next leader, president and CEO of the Minnesota Orchestra. Congratulations, and great talking with you.

Isaac Thompson: Thank you,Tom. Great to talk to you as well.

When Australian genre-bending rock band King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard decided to launch a U.S. tour — complete with orchestral accompaniment — to celebrate their newest album, they turned to a master of the classical-pop crossover.

Minnesota Orchestra conductor Sarah Hicks, with her prowess as a film-score specialist and as a collaborator with such musicians as Sting, Dessa and Smokey Robinson, was deemed the ideal fit for the band’s eight-date tour with seven different orchestras.

“The band searched the world for a conductor who works with other artists in this vein,” Hicks says of the genesis of her involvement. “I was sought out for my expertise — this isn’t unusual in the orchestral world, unlike other musical worlds.”

Hicks has never worked with King Gizzard, but “I have known their music,” she says. “The first album I heard was Flying Microtonal Banana [from 2017]. I was into mood music, and someone told me there’s this band working with an interesting sound world.”

It is a world Hicks has great appreciation for. “Their level of creativity — dropping five albums a year — it’s an astonishing approach to what it is to be an artist, to be connected with fans,” she says. “That philosophy, that spirit of artistry, I connect with that.”

Phantom Island, the album that inspired the tour, was an experimental foray by King Gizzard into the realm of classical accompaniment. “It was conceived with classical instruments to begin with and was meant to be performed with orchestral ensembles,” Hicks says.

If the part of the concerts focusing on Phantom Island is classically “bespoke,” as Hicks puts it, the other half comprises classical settings (by arranger Sean O’Laughlin) of other King Gizzard albums, “which really shows the scope of what they have to offer,” Hicks says.

Hicks has become an expert in recognizing what other musical genres have to offer.

 “As a person who’s working in rock, country and pop, and being steeped in the orchestral tradition, it’s an incredible joy to bring worlds together,” she says. She loves when audiences “see their favorite artist through a new lens; it opens up ears and eyes to what their favorite music can sound like.

“For me, in a larger sense, it’s creating an incredible communal live experience.”

Hicks’ journey from youthful training as a classical violist and pianist and degrees in conducting to her current advocacy for expanding the musical vocabulary has been years in the making.

“It began 20 years ago when I did a concert with [the band] Pink Martini,” she explains. “It made me realize the scope of the orchestra, and I wanted to expand that universe.

“I’m a seeker — I’m afraid, and deeply desire, to try new things. That’s my internal conflict!” Hicks admits. “But to keep art forms moving forward and connect with other art forms — collaborating with visual arts and different genres — that’s my personal philosophy. That keeps me going, and I really want to create these experiences for people.”

She likes to think that of life’s “big experiences” — she lists religion, sports and music as examples — “music is the only unifying one. It’s a mission of mine, making sure I bring people together, anything I can do to accomplish that.”

Hicks, whose official title with the Minnesota Orchestra is Principal Conductor of Live at Orchestra Hall, will have her work cut out for her with the compressed tour schedule (July 28 to Aug. 11) and the aforementioned seven orchestras.

Hicks, the band and each orchestra will only have a two-and-a-half-hour rehearsal on the day of each show (except for the first show, in Philadelphia, which will get extra rehearsal time to work out any kinks). She’s excited to see the concerts come to life “after just being theoretical,” she says.

The King Gizzard tour is part of a larger pop-and-classical crossover trend. The duo Watchhouse has teamed up with the Colorado Symphony; the Americana band Steep Canyon Rangers plays next spring with the Nashville Symphony; singer-songwriter Faye Webster will finish up her current world tour with three concerts including full orchestral accompaniment; and Icelandic singer Laufey (who is also a classically trained and accomplished cellist) will bring an orchestra onstage in several stops on her current tour.

Hicks explains that it all just makes sense: From a business perspective, there’s been a desire over the past decade or so for orchestras to foster and nurture audiences outside of their core classical mission. And of the other half of the equation, she says, “Artists are realizing, ‘Wouldn’t that be cool, to bring our music to different audiences?’ It’s a symbiotic relationship from both directions.”

Hicks is looking forward to her relationship with the “Gizzverse.”  “This is such a cool project, with a band that speaks in so many micro languages,” she says. “It’s really exciting to be able to see artists that keep pushing the boundary.

“That’s what music should be about, new ways of expression. It will be an incredible tour, and I’m really excited.”

Tour info

What: King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard’s Phantom Island tour, with orchestral accompaniment directed by Sarah Hicks

When: July 28, with Chamber Orchestra of Philadelphia, TD Pavilion at the Mann, Philadelphia, Pa.; July 30, with Orchestra of St. Luke’s, Westville Music Bowl, New Haven, Conn.; Aug. 1, with Orchestra of St. Luke’s, Forest Hills Stadium Forest Hills, N.Y.; Aug. 4, with National Symphony Orchestra, Merriweather Post Pavilion, Columbia, Md.; Aug. 6, with Chicago Philharmonic, Ravinia Festival, Highland Park, Ill.; Aug. 8, with Colorado Symphony, Ford Amphitheatre, Colorado Springs, Colo.; Aug. 10, with Hollywood Bowl Orchestra, Hollywood Bowl, Los Angeles, Calif.; Aug. 11, with San Diego Symphony, Rady Shell at Jacobs Park, San Diego, Calif.

Tickets: Varies by venue.

Alfred Brendel, the thoughtful Austrian pianist who focused on the classics, has died. A statement from his representative said that Brendel passed peacefully on Tuesday morning at his home in London, surrounded by his family. He was 94.

Praised by The Boston Globe as "one of the defining performers of our age," Brendel was best known as a performer who fused a keen intelligence with musical clarity. Other players were flashier; other players were, perhaps, more outwardly passionate. But Brendel had legions of ardent admirers.

Even Brendel himself confessed to documentary filmmaker Mark Kidel, who profiled him in 2000, that he found his success something of a mystery. "My career is atypical," Brendel said. "I have not been a child prodigy. My parents were not musicians — there was no music in the house. I have a good memory, but not a phenomenal one. I'm not a good sight reader. I'm completely at a loss to explain why I made it!"

Brendel was widely praised for his cerebral, lucid piano playing. But Tim Page, a Pulitzer Prize-winning music critic, says his playing wasn't for everyone's tastes.

"Some people found him dry," Page notes. "Some people found him perhaps a little bit over-scholastic. But there are others who really felt that this was a really first-class musical brain, working on some of the great music in the repertory."

Alfred Brendel was born in Wiesenberg, in what is now the Czech Republic, on Jan. 5, 1931. He had a peripatetic childhood, spending his early years in what was then Yugoslavia as well as Austria, as the family followed his father around to jobs as an architectural engineer, a businessman, a resort hotel manager and director of a local cinema.

While Brendel had some formal training — including a few years at the conservatory in Graz, Austria — he was largely self-taught. After an appearance in London in the 1970s, his international star began to rise.

Brendel was best known for his interpretations of the standard classical repertoire. Regarding Mozart, he said many players shied away from the composer — either because they didn't see his work's complexity and found it too easy, or did see the complexity and found it too difficult.

"When you play the sonatas," he told NPR in 2004, "you are all alone. And there are relatively few notes that you have to play. And every single one of these notes lays bare. It is a delicate balance between poise and seemingly casual delivery, which is necessary."

He was the first pianist to record the complete piano works of Beethoven, with three separate cycles of the 32 sonatas. "Because I am not one of the pianists who learns a piece, plays it and discards it," he told NPR, "I feel that one should keep in touch with those pieces which are really worth playing and live with them through a lifetime."

Brendel also wrote volumes of poetry and essays on music. He was known for his wit — a lecture he gave at Cambridge, England, in 1984 was titled "Does Classical Music Have to Be Entirely Serious?" — which extended to a fondness for Dadaist art and a collection of kitsch objects.

Just weeks before his 78th birthday, Brendel retired from public performance, giving his last concert at the gilded Musikverein in Vienna, playing a youthful yet enigmatic piano concerto by Mozart and a solo piece by Liszt, another of his favorite composers. Still, he remained busy, writing, painting and lecturing for years to come.

Copyright 2025, NPR

Welcome to YourClassical’s Cliburn Blog for the 2025 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition! Every four years, the classical music world turns its eyes to Fort Worth, Texas, to see which pianists from a pool of 30 can manage two-and-a-half weeks of rigorous recitals and concertos to emerge as a medal winner. Medal winners receive a cash prize in addition to a professional management contract, concert tours, and a commercial recording.

Monday, June 9

THE FINALS, Day 4 + THE WINNERS

by Joe Goetz

The last day of the 2025 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition featured the last three concertos with the Fort Worth Symphony, and then the much-anticipated awards ceremony. The trajectories of three lives and careers were altered in a tremendous way.  We’ll get to who won what (which you may already know!) after a brief breakdown of the final three concerto performances.

Vitaly Starikov: Schumann – Piano Concerto in A Minor, Op. 54

Starikov’s performance of Chopin’s Op. 25 Etudes in the semifinal round foreshadowed his performance of Schumann in the final: uneven start, strong finish. Starikov’s opening chords, and his chosen opening tempo, seemed lethargic and plodding to me. His playing was, as expected, lyrical and flowing. But I wanted more urgency in this first movement. After the concerto’s brief slow movement, the finale begins attaca, and Starikov launched into a more conventional tempo. This movement features endless arpeggios, and any pianist who performs it runs the risk of making it sound like a Czerny exercise, but Starikov avoided that trap completely. It was a thrilling and gorgeous conclusion.

Carter Johnson: Ravel – Piano Concerto for the Left Hand

Rumors swirled in the chat that Carter Johnson was nursing a right hand injury during the competition. I never saw an official confirmation of this, and as the kids say these days, that seemed pretty ”sus.” I’m not sure how he could have gotten through an entire competition, let alone the Prokofiev 2, with a lame right hand. But I digress. His performance of Ravel’s left hand concerto was the first ever, I believe, at the Cliburn. The work’s technical demands (and obvious limitations!) aside, I was most impressed with Johnson’s playing in the tender moments of this piece. The long and flowing cadenza that leads to the work’s finale was especially sensitive and beautiful. A quirky choice, this concerto, and one that was a fitting capstone to a highly entertaining and unusually programmed Cliburn run from the American.

Philipp Lynov: Prokofiev: Piano Concerto No. 2 in G Minor, Op. 16

If Carter Johnson’s performance of this work a few days prior was an academic reading, then Lynov’s was an exercise in brute force. I found his interpretation superior to Johnson’s in almost every way. It may not have been as note-perfect, but it was full of the vigorous anger the piece requires. The movement that gets talked about least in this concerto is its third, which isn’t a slow movement as would be traditionally the case. It’s not terribly fast, either, but the best word I can think of to describe it is “menacing,” and that’s just the vibe that Lynov brought to it. A contestant who has gotten steadily stronger through each round of the competition, he saved his best for last.

Now, onto the awards. Aside from the gold, silver, and bronze medals, a number of special awards were distributed. 

Beverley Taylor Smith Awards for the Best Performance of a New Work
Yangrui Cai, China
Cash award of $5,000

Best Performance of a Mozart Concerto
Evren Ozel, United States
Cash award of $5,000

John Giordano Jury Chairman Discretionary Award
Mikhail Kambarov, Russia
Cash award of $4,000

Raymond E. Buck Jury Discretionary Award
Jonas Aumiller, Germany
Cash award of $4,000

Patricia and Neal Steffen Family Jury Discretionary Award
Alice Burla, Canada
Cash award of $4,000

Carla and Kelly Thompson Audience Award
Aristo Sham, Hong Kong China
Cash award of $2,500

As for the medalists, here they are with my thoughts about each:

BRONZE MEDAL
Evren Ozel, United States
The Minnesota resident in me, of course, is thrilled that Minneapolis native Evren Ozel won a medal. I also believe, geography notwithstanding, that Ozel was the finest overall musician among the finalists. He may not have had the technical wizardry of some of the others (or chose not to display it, at least), but his sensitivity and connection to the orchestra and his audience was undeniable. It made his more virtuosic moments that much more powerful (I’m thinking of the octaves at the end of Tchaikovsky 1st concerto, for instance). I can’t wait to see what he does next, as he’s only 26, already an Avery Fisher Career Grant recipient, and has a tremendous career ahead.

SILVER MEDAL
Vitaly Starikov, Israel/Russia
I’ve underestimated Starikov’s appeal with the judges throughout this competition and did so again when it came to the medalists. His uneven performances of certain works in each round did not derail his chances, and his performance of Bartok’s second concerto in the finals will be talked about for years to come. Keeping in mind that the judges are grading as much on career potential and marketability as much as performance in the moment, I think it was his remarkable Bartok that led him here. He wouldn’t have been my choice for silver, but I’m not upset about it, either. He also seems like just a super nice dude, one with whom I’d love to grab a beer and a burger and nerd out about music.

NANCY LEE AND PERRY R. BASS GOLD MEDAL
Aristo Sham, Hong Kong China
Aristo Sham, according to a conversation I had on Reddit with Eugene Chan, creator of those awesome Don’t Shoot the Pianist comics, is the first Cliburn gold medalist since 1977 to not play a Tchairachiev concerto in the final round (Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, or Prokofiev). He did it not by being an overpowering virtuoso or an overly sensitive interpreter, but by consistently performing very difficult works at a very high level. His Gaspard de la Nuit in the preliminary round was the best of the competition. His daring choice to do Beethoven Hammerklavier in the second round paid off. Rachmaninoff’s complete Op. 39 Etudes-Tableux in the semifinals were dazzling, if imperfect. His Mozart concerto was warm, even if not terribly personal. And his culminating Brahms Piano Concerto No. 2 in the finals was the cherry on top, a tour de force that avoided sentimentality but was still a rich and full musical experience. He now has the distinct disadvantage of being The Next Person to win Cliburn gold following Yunchan Lim, a generational talent. I don’t see Sham moving the needle to that degree, but he has proven himself a worthy performer who will excel in any setting, with just about any repertoire.

Of the other three finalists, I predict that Angel Stanislav Wang will likely have the most prolific career, possibly one that eclipses at least some of the medal winners. He’s already won a silver medal at the 2023 Tchaikovsky Competition (as you may recall, Van Cliburn’s gold medal in the inaugural Tchaikovsky was the reason we’re all reading this today), in addition to dozens of other wins at other competitions. As he matures, his ability to dazzle with his prodigious technique and his willingness to wear his heart on his sleeve will be irresistible to audiences and presenters.

Carter Johnson will continue to shed light on the lesser-known parts of the repertoire. I hope he lands a recording contract somewhere, the results would be fascinating.

And Philipp Lynov is an underrated lion of the keyboard. I’m not sure how much more of him we will see in the United States, but I am sure he will be a household name in Europe and certainly his native Russia.

I’ll have one more post in a few days detailing my favorite performances from the entire competition from each finalist. For now, thanks for reading and being along with me on this journey.  This is my first time covering a major competition, and it’s been a lot of fun, but also exhausting. I think my family will be thrilled for me to shut up about the Cliburn for a while, and to go back to our normal Netflix/Max/et cetera nightly routine. I hope you enjoyed the blog, and thanks to the listeners of YourClassical for their support that allowed me the space to do it!

Gallery: Awards Ceremony

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Saturday, June 7

THE FINALS, Day 3

by Joe Goetz

The third night of final round concertos featured three audience favorites by Beethoven, Rachmaninoff, and Brahms. Everyone performed about as I expected them to, so there were no surprises. Let’s get into the details…

Evren Ozel: Beethoven - Piano Concerto No. 4 in G Major, Op. 58

This work seemed to be tailor-made for Ozel’s sensitive playing. It’s probably the sunniest, and maybe the most romantic of Beethoven’s five piano concertos. Ozel’s personality - and his vulnerability - shone through in the work’s quiet solo opening, but for most of the first movement he was perhaps a bit…too quiet? I will say that the livestream of Ozel’s performance seemed marred by distortion, as I heard some odd digital artifacts during louder passages. Those issues seemed to clear up for the other concertos later in the evening. In any event, it took a bit for Ozel and the orchestra to lock into agreement on dynamics and balance. Once they did, Ozel’s connection with his orchestral compatriots and his audience took over, as it did during his Mozart concerto in the semifinals. The final movement featured plenty of whimsy and energy, earning Ozel a raucous ovation. On the whole, it was a very musical performance, as we’ve come to expect from Ozel, who in my opinion is the most musically sound contestant remaining in the competition. If I had one quibble at all it would be that perhaps he was too sensitive, and perhaps by extension a tad tentative. But in a competition where the impetus of many is to push the pedal to the floor, having Ozel as an antidote may pay him dividends.

Angel Stanislav Wang: Rachmaninoff - Piano Concerto No. 3 in D minor, Op. 30

Let’s first address the elephant in the room about this concerto, and that’s the fact that anyone who chooses to play it at the Cliburn (or any competition, really) on the heels of Yunchan Lim’s performance in 2022 must have a boatload of confidence. Wang has proven time and again that he does, even when it gets him into some uncomfortable spots. He and anyone who’s been following the Cliburn knew that he needed a transcendent Rach 3 last night in order to move the needle, and I don’t think he accomplished that. It was the performance of a young man with infinite potential, but lacking the refinement necessary to jump to the level of the truly elite. Once again, like his Beethoven earlier in the finals, he seemed to ignore Marin Alsop completely. He chose the lighter of the two first movement cadenzas, which I don’t mind at all, but seemed to go against his usual take-no-prisoners musical choices. In fact, he took several of the rarely-heard (at least in modern times) cuts that Rachmaninoff himself made to the second and third movements. Some of the tempo changes and musical emphases were awkward, and the work’s mighty conclusion felt more tired than grand. All that said, i still enjoyed the heck out of watching him play. And his genuinely emotional reaction to having finished, lingering at the piano for a few moments before standing and embracing Alsop and acknowledging the crowd, was touching.

Aristo Sham: Brahms: Piano Concerto No. 2 in B-flat Major, Op. 83

If we were to assign superlatives to each of Friday evening’s performers, we’d probably assign Evren Ozel “Most Musical,” Angel Wang “Most Dramatic,” and Aristo Sham “Best Execution.” Brahms 2 is a beast, there are no two ways about it. And Sham absolutely nailed every thorny passage, every double trill, every awkward leap. It was a positively Herculean effort, yet I came away from it feeling like something was missing. I can’t quite put my finger on it, but there are many moments during the piece where the pianist can dial back Brahms’s ruthless precision and explore more ethereal spaces. A great example is this spot in the first movement, where the piano floats off into dreamland for a few moments before the horns, clarinets, and upper strings herald the return of the main theme.

It’s marked legato dolce, but Sham played it rather piercingly. He was able to find more sensitivity in the work’s gorgeous third movement, and playfulness in the finale, but genuine joy and personality were lacking, at least from my perspective. But at the end of the day, Aristo Sham is just too good to not medal. I’d be shocked if he received anything less than silver at this point, but we’ve been surprised by judge’s decisions plenty so far!

Three more concertos on tap this afternoon, then we’ll know the winners this evening.

Thursday, June 5

THE FINALS, Day 2

by Joe Goetz

Last night was one of the wildest and most compelling nights of Cliburn concertos I can remember. After it was over, I was trying to come up with adjectives to describe what I had just witnessed: courageous, bold, bizarre, proficient, amazing all came to mind, yet none of those words perfectly encapsulates the playing by the three pianists and the Fort Wort Symphony. Everyone rose to the moment last night!

Philipp Lynov: Liszt - Piano Concerto No. 2 in A Major
The episodic nature of this concerto was the perfect way to showcase all the things he brings to the table. Lynov has grown stronger in each round so far, and his Liszt 2 was a perfect capstone to everything he’s performed so far. Everything in his previous round performances found a home in his interpretation: the impetuousness of his Schumann sonata, the virtuosity from his Barber and Prokofiev sonatas, the tenderness of his Ravel Miroirs, and the free-wheeling fun of Rachtime all found their way into last night. Although is mannerisms and hair suggest he’s trying to be the heir apparent to Daniil Trifonov, he’s not quite at that level, but he’s proven himself ready for prime time. Top marks, all around.

Vitaly Starikov: Bartok - Piano Concerto No. 2 in G Major
Ever since seeing this concerto on his repertoire list at the beginning of the competition, I was worried. To perform such a work in a competition is almost unheard of, mainly because a) it’s so ridiculously hard, and b) turning this piece around on a tight rehearsal schedule could be a suicide mission. Yet Starikov, Marin Alsop, and the Fort Worth Symphony pulled it off and then some. I watched the beginning like I watch videos of those people that run up a greased pole, just waiting for that moment when the painful crash would happen. And it never came. The orchestra was incredible. Starikov was on point. This was the pianist I had hoped to see in the earlier rounds, and evidently the judges were able to anticipate he would meet this moment when they elevated him to the ranks of finalists. Absolute class from the entire group, and a performance that will likely be talked about for years, regardless of where Starikov finishes in the competition.

Carter Johnson: Prokofiev - Piano Concerto No. 2 in G Minor, Op. 16
I’ve been high on Carter Johnson since his preliminary recital (which featured some solo Prokofiev), and I’m still high on him, but a few pegs lower after last night. It’s not that he didn’t play this piece well - he really did, but there seemed to be a higher gear that was missing. Usually I’m critical of pianists who overdo it on the bombast, but I felt that Carter actually needed more bombast last night. His playing was far from thin gruel, but if there was ever a concerto that begged to be absolutely rocked, this is the one. In the massive first movement cadenza, his interpretation felt more academic than ferocious. The second movement’s moto perpetuo wrist-breaking virtuosity was a highlight, as was the smaller cadenza at the end of the final movement. Look, Carter Johnson has it all, no doubt. But I just wanted more gravitas from this piece, more raw anger and passion, and I just didn’t sense that from last night. Others may disagree.

We’ve now heard concertos from all six finalists, and tonight is a much-deserved break for all. I’ll be interested to see how the each finalist’s choice of concerto factors into their evaluation by the judges. Evren Ozel and Angel Stanislav Wang are going the more traditional competition route with Beethoven (or similar) plus a big warhorse by Tchaikovsky or Rachmaninoff. But everyone else is going against the grain: Aristo Sham choosing Mendelssohn and Brahms yet ignoring the Russian repertoire completely, Philipp Lynov choosing two highly virtuosic works and ignoring Beethoven, Carter Johnson being kind of a hipster by pairing Prokofiev 2 with Ravel’s left hand concerto, and Vitaly Starikov pairing Bartok 2 with…Schumann? The 2025 Cliburn may not be remembered for having a generational standout talent like Yunchan Lim three years ago, but it’s definitely attained its own brand of bold, bizarre, and fascinating.

Wednesday, June 4

THE FINALS, Day 1

by Joe Goetz

Tuesday night saw the beginning of the final round of the 2025 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition. The finals are when most people really start paying attention - Bass Hall was packed, and the livestream on YouTube had about double the viewers of the previous rounds. Everyone loves a concerto! And last night, they heard three. Let’s dive in.

Aristo Sham: Mendelssohn - Piano Concerto No 1 in G minor, Op. 25

As Osip alluded to yesterday, this concerto is very much like a bottle of champagne. It was a sparkling start to the evening, as Sham’s scales, arpeggios, and octaves flew up and down the keyboard. It was nearly flawless execution, with brilliant shaping throughout. My only quibble was with the choice of the concerto itself, which, while an enjoyable listen (and a boatload of fun to play, as my 15 year-old self can attest), doesn’t really offer many opportunities to show off one’s depth of artistry. I thought Sham’s middle movement, the one long stretch to be truly expressive, to be a bit on the static side. All that aside, it was a confident performance. He’ll have a chance to explore more depth, endurance, and raw power when he tackles Brahms’s mighty second concerto on Friday night.

Angel Stanislav Wang: Beethoven - Piano Concerto No. 4 in G Major, Op. 58

I mentioned on Monday that Wang was on my final round bubble. Spellbinding preliminary and quarterfinal recitals were followed by shakier performances in the semifinals, both for his solo recital and the Mozart concerto. That shakiness continued into the finals, where the quiet solo introduction was muddled and slow. It seemed as though conductor Marin Alsop tried to push the tempo forward a bit once the orchestra entered, but to no avail. That’s not to say there weren’t great moments in this concerto - there certainly were! His second movement was gorgeous. In general, though, I found that Angel’s performance suffered from a lack of direction and lack of partnership. I don’t think I saw him engage with Marin Alsop at any point, and given that concertos should be partnerships among soloist, conductor, and orchestra, this lack of engagement seemed to drag the energy down. Angel will have a chance to redeem himself on Friday night, where I’m guessing he’ll swing for the fences with Rachmaninoff’s epic Piano Concerto No. 3.

Evren Ozel: Tchaikovsky: Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-flat Minor, Op. 23

In contrast to Angel Stanislav Wang, Evren Ozel seems to thrive on communication with the musicians around him. He had already proved himself to be a more than capable soloist in his first two rounds, and then came the joy he shared with the Fort Worth Symphony and Carlos Miguel Prieto during his Mozart concerto in the semifinals. I was worried about this choice of piece for Ozel, which turned out to be a completely dumb worry on my part. His Tchaikovsky concerto was, as the late ESPN anchor Stuart Scott loved to say, “cooler than the other side of the pillow.” He avoided the rushing octaves in the middle of the first movement where many pianists look to show off. His tender opening to the second movement was exceptional, and he kept his true virtuosic powder dry until the giant octaves that lead into the work’s mighty coda. Just like in Mozart, smiles were on the menu for all, and it’s clear Ozel clearly derives great pleasure not just in his own music-making, but in sharing that music with his fellow performers and the audience. He’ll be back on Friday night as well, leading off that night’s concertos with Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4.

I’ll be watching tonight’s concertos on delay, as my kids have a track meet. Liszt from Philipp Lynov, Bartok(!!!) from Vitaly Starikov, and Prokofiev from Carter Johnson are all on tap, and I’ll have a recap tomorrow morning.

Tuesday, June 3

Know Your Concerto!

by Osip Nikiforov

A note from Joe Goetz: I asked Osip, a fabulous concert pianist in his own right, to provide us with his analysis of the ten concertos we’ll hear in the finals of the 2025 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition. This is an essential read if you plan to watch the finals, as he points out all kinds of details he’ll be listening to, as well as the potential booby traps that might ensnare our very worthy but very exhausted six finalists. Enjoy!

Felix Mendelssohn: Piano Concerto No. 1 in G Minor, Op. 25
This lively and effervescent concerto will open the final round like a bottle of champagne. This concerto is often associated with junior piano competitions, mostly because of its length and the aforementioned liveliness, but in reality it is a technically demanding (if played in the prescribed tempos) and not so “light” piano concerto (with cascades of octaves in both hands!) that demands from the pianist a lot of ensemble work with the orchestra. Though this concerto is in three movements, they are all connected without a traditional break in between the movements. It will be very important for the pianist to start the engine right away with the first series of two-hand octaves at the very beginning of the work, as it will set the tone for the rest of the concerto. Given the blistering tempos of this concerto’s first and last movements, it will also be imperative for the pianist to listen to the winds (specifically woodwinds) very closely throughout this work, as it is typically easy to get ahead of them on the keys. I would expect the pianist to choose a lighter piano of the ones available, since this can make the pianist’s life infinitely easier particularly in this work. What a bubbly opening this one will bring! 

Ludwig van Beethoven: Piano Concerto No. 4 in G Major, Op. 58
Staying in the same key of G major (the Mendelssohn will end in G major despite the key of the piece), we will immerse ourselves in the world of the sumptuous Beethoven G major piano concerto twice in this final round. Since the soloist opens this concerto with a recitative-like material, it will be revealing immediately how this concerto will be interpreted. We may get a completely different outlook on the opening phrase, like what the legendary pianist Mikhail Pletnev did in his bright and spontaneous start of the concerto (you can listen to it here). In any case, we will be listening to it attentively. Beyond this, the first movement has some invisible-to-the-naked eye challenges, one of which is how convincingly the pianist finishes their solo phrases and passes them on to the orchestra. In the second movement, it will be paramount for the pianist to capture the overall somber character - the imagery of Orpheus taming the Furies – and the tightly engaged dialogue between the piano and the orchestra. A lot can be revealed about the caliber of the musician in this movement. As for the finale, the pianist will be tasked with starting it in a dance-like manner of a rondo but keep themselves in check and away from derailment in the cascading broken arpeggios that this movement is full of. I am personally looking forward to hearing this concerto in the competition! 

Peter Tchaikovsky: Piano Concerto No. 1 in B-flat Minor, Op. 23
Although this concerto has really been overplayed in my head for some time now (mainly because of other competitions), it is not nearly as often performed at Cliburn as some of the other “workhorses”. Despite not being considered the most difficult piano concerto to perform, it is quite awkward to play pianistically and packs a number of technical traps that are at first not so obvious. For example, I will be watching for the cascading chord spots in the high register in the first movement, the nimble and swift middle part of the second movement, and the main theme of the finale, which is notoriously easy to mess up. Of course, we should not forget about the famous thunderous series of octaves that the first and last movements bring, which are perhaps the emblems of this concerto. Nor should we forget how decisive the long and multi-layered piano cadenza in the first movement can be for the whole performance effect and structure of the work. I am also curious to see if Evren Ozel will decide to not go with the interpretative clichés of this concerto, like the accelerating octaves in the middle of the finale before the orchestra’s tutti, for example. These clichés are mainly found in the tempo transitions of the concerto. This piece will bring an exciting end to the first day of the final round. 

Franz Liszt: Piano Concerto No. 2 in A Major
This concerto is one of those concertos that erase the boundaries between the clear (and traditional) concerto movement setup. It is in one single movement but has six distinct sections that are centered around several themes. These sections are all connected by Liszt’s emblematic “thematic transformations”, which are basically melodic permutations. The thing to pay attention to is how the pianist’s high register material will be blending with the woodwinds – an important interacting point throughout the concerto. Just like in the Mendelssohn, there is always a danger for the pianist to get ahead in his part, be it in the octave passages or the arpeggios. I am also interested in hearing how the pedal will be used in this concerto by the pianist, since it is very easy to step on it and forget about it, creating a constant swash of sound. To me, it is perhaps one of the more personal choices in this piece. I cannot wait for the hair-raising coda at the end! 

Bela Bartok: Piano Concerto No. 2 in G Major
This will be beyond interesting. Not only would you be hard-pressed to attend this piano concerto’s live performance anywhere in the world, as it is rarely done, it is quite literally “unheard of” in a competition setting. I cannot recall ever seeing it performed at any competition or even having it on a competition concerto list. In any case, it is a good bet that it will be the Cliburn’s first ever performance of it. In the world of piano concertos, this work is among the most difficult, complex, and finger-breaking piano concertos ever written. There’s a reason why no one wants to perform it in a competition, where the rehearsal time is very limited. I am not only worried about the lack of time for rehearsing this work from the soloist’s standpoint, I am a little more worried about the orchestra getting it all together in a record time, also considering that they must rehearse nine other concertos and have eleven other performances. Again, from the soloist’s point of view, this concerto presents a possible opportunity to stand out from the rest of the group by presenting something rarely played and of utmost difficulty, but it could also backfire because of the jury’s relative unfamiliarity with it, as I am quite sure only few of them know this work intimately. What should we pay attention to in this concerto? Watch the tight collaboration between the pianist and individual instruments in the orchestra. In the first movement, there will be lots of interaction between the piano and the trumpet; in the second one, there will be some between the piano and the woodwinds. Expect to be absolutely covered in cross rhythms and syncopations. There will be a lot of hand crossovers and tremolos in the piano part in the second movement and lots of leaps in the finale. At any rate, it will be fascinating to see it live at the Cliburn! 

Sergei Rachmaninoff: Piano Concerto No. 3 in D Minor, Op. 30
The Cliburn Competition would not be the Cliburn if it didn’t feature at least once the awe-provoking, magisterial, and show-stopping concerto of all piano concertos (pardon my hyperbole). The expectations will be sky-high for this one because of the last edition’s winner’s triumph with this work and the standard that he set for this piece. This, however, should not be on the performer’s mind when he is on the stage on the third day of the finals. What will we be watching for in this behemoth of a concerto? There will be a lot of things. Perhaps, the most important one will be regarding the pianist’s interaction with the orchestra and the interpretation matching between the soloist and the conductor. Will the pianist choose the short or long cadenza in the first movement? This will significantly impact the impression of the concerto’s form perception. Also, it will be interesting to see what tempo the performer will elect for the first movement and particularly the finale. Will this be on the slower, more controlled side, or will the tempo be revved up? We will have to wait to find out. Regardless of the tempo, it will be a workout for the pianist who in different moments has to stay flexible to accompany and follow the orchestra and at the same time very firm to lead and even push it. With this concerto, however, lots of excitement is guaranteed. 

Johannes Brahms: Piano Concerto No. 2 in B-flat Major, Op. 83
This is another behemoth of piano concertos that firmly sits in the Romantic repertoire of the 19th century and is one of the longest concertos ever written, taking about 50 minutes to complete. Although it will not be nearly as difficult to rehearse as the Bartok Piano Concerto No. 2, the soloist will still find himself pressed for rehearsal time and will have to be very purposeful about which spots to focus his most attention on, since it is, perhaps, the most “chamber-music-like” concerto in the final round. As my teacher, Yefim Bronfman, would say “once you’re done with the first two movements, you are in the clear for the rest”, this paints you the structure that this concerto has. It is almost as if this concerto was composed backwards in terms of heaviness of each movement – both in difficulty and scope. The things to watch out in the first movement will be the octave and chord jumps in both hands, occurring separately, that will be mixed with single notes in between- a notoriously difficult spot in the concerto that comes twice in the movement. As for the second movement, all I can say is that it is a left-hand workout in terms of transitions between the lowest register and the middle part of the keyboard. These have to be done fast, even if the soloist plays in the most “musical” manner, therefore, allowing a little more time for those jumps. The chamber-like quality of this concerto is in full display in the third movement, but watch out for the series of tightly composed chords in both hands in the piano part that are unexpectedly confusing to play for the pianist. After that, enjoy the dance-like finale. I am ecstatic that we will hear this concerto in the final round! 

Robert Schumann: Piano Concerto in A Minor, Op 54
Although, this is a staple in the Romantic piano concerto repertoire, it is not as often heard in piano competitions. It is certainly a very “musical” choice from the competitor to select this work. The first movement will explore the musical contrast of the conflict between the passionate Florestan and the introspective Eusebius – the two characters that Schumann often self-associates in his music. There is also a very expressive cadenza near the end of the movement that acts as a grand culmination. Watch for a lot of eye contact between the soloist and the solo lines of the orchestral instruments in the second movement. Also, prepare for the smooth and seamless transition into the finale, which is full of colorful weaving lines and vivacious character. This will be a fitting work to start the last day of performances at the Cliburn! 

Maurice Ravel: Piano Concerto for the Left Hand in D Major
Another very unusual selection for any piano competition would be this concerto. This is certainly because a competitor usually wants to demonstrate their ability to perform a piano concerto with two hands, so it has nothing to do with the quality of music of this work. The central question for this work is (perhaps amusingly), will the pianist rest his right hand on the lap or on the lid area? We shall see. As for the layout of this concerto, it is in one movement but displays an unusual structure within having a perceived slow-fast-slow section layout. Expect an intentional ambiguity between the duple and triple rhythms throughout this concerto and, of course, lots of arpeggios in the left hand as one of the primary devices in the solo part. I am not sure if the pianist is left-handed, but if he is, it will be a good advantage to possess!

Sergei Prokofiev Piano Concerto No. 2 in G minor, Op. 16
We will also be hearing two contestants play this work in the final round – one of them finishing the last day of the final round performances. This is one of the piano concerto behemoths in the piano repertoire. Having played this concerto on numerous occasions, I know firsthand that the pianist must have 100% focus throughout the concerto, as there is no slow movement, per se, where the pianist can take a breather. One of the unique features of this concerto is the ginormous cadenza in the first movement that takes half of it. It’s no doubt the most experimental and wild cadenza written for a piano concerto by a composer in the tonal language. That being said, it may not be the most difficult part of the concerto. The second movement is, in a way, more challenging because of its awkward and angular two-hand unison perpetual motion passages in a blazing fast tempo. The third movement is where the pianist can technically “recalibrate”, although it is not so straightforward to do, since the movement is full of hand crossovers and occasional chord leaps over the whole keyboard. Speaking of really wide leaps, you will be witnessing a plethora of them from the get-go in the finale. Given that this work is the last work (a heavy one!) on the contestants’ long program menu in the competition, perhaps don’t expect them to nail every leap in this treacherous movement. I will also be listening to the cadenza that comes near the end of the last movement as well as to the returning of the intro material at the very end that almost acts as a coda – this is the place where it is easy to lose focus after such a long journey. If this is your first time listening to this concerto, buckle up, as we will be experiencing a wild rollercoaster of a piece!

Monday, June 2

Semifinals, Day Five + The Finalists are Revealed

by Joe Goetz

Sunday was the last day of the Cliburn semifinals, and with the Mozart concertos all done, all that remained were four solo recitals. Of these four remaining pianists, only one moved on to the finals, and it was not at all who I expected. More on the finalists after the recap…

Semifinal Recitals, Sunday afternoon

Philipp Lynov opened the afternoon with two giants works: Ravel’s Miroirs and Prokofiev’s Piano Sonata No. 8. Lynov’s full range of colors was on display during the Ravel, a work that while less difficult than the more often played Gaspard de la Nuit, still requires pianists to summon just about every skill in their toolkit. I was especially struck by the soundscape Lynov created in the work’s final movement, La vallée des cloches. Lynov opted for another “second place in the popularity contest” selection with his Prokofiev. Longer than the more popular 7th sonata, it’s every bit as difficult. Its rollicking coda in B-flat major was Lynov’s strongest performance in the competition to date, and as it turned out, it propelled him to the final round.

Up next, Chaeyoung Park explored the sacred and the profane with a fascinating musical journey that began with Myra Hess’s famous transcription of Bach’s Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring and culminated with Beethoven’s monstrous Hammerklavier Sonata. The serenity and godliness of the Bach was followed without pause by the twisted sound world of Scriabin’s Piano Sonata No. 9 , Op. 68 ‘Black Mass.’ What a stunning segue that was, and with a commanding performance of the Beethoven to close out her recital, I thought she was a lock for the finals. She…was not, I’m afraid. More on that later.

Semifinal recitals, Sunday evening

Poland’s Piotr Alexewicz, fresh off his triumphant Mozart concerto a few nights prior, opted to begin his recital with Schumann’s intimate Fantasie in C Major, Op. 17. Almost a sonata in disguise, Piotr really shone in the work’s second section, an exuberant quais-march in E-flat major, and faked out the audience with that section’s apparently culmination of the entire work, only to bring everyone back to earth with a gorgeous actual conclusion. Judging by the live chat on the YouTube stream, everyone was very excited to hear Chopin’s Piano Sonata No. 2 played by a Polish contestant. Alas, I found his performance of the work to be lackluster. The scherzo and famous funeral march were marred by a lack of forward momentum, and the mysterious finale lacked shape. On the surface, that last movement looks like a cacophony of whirling notes, but deep within it there’s a harmonic structure that should be pronounced. It also needs menace, which I thought Piotr lacked. In any event, he shifted gears delightfully for his ending, George Gershwin’s Three Preludes. What a fun way to go out! He won’t be in the finals, but he’s to be a contestant in this fall’s Chopin Competition in Warsaw, where he’ll surely be a local favorite.

Finally, Yangrui Cai offered some Prokofiev that wasn’t one of the famous War Sonatas. Ten Pieces from Romeo and Juliet, Op. 75 started his recital off with an entertaining spark, as over the course of a little over thirty minutes we were treated to all the characters and drama of Shakespeare’s play through Prokofiev’s own piano arrangement of his ballet. My wife, who was busy preparing materials for her fifth grade classroom while we watched, said “this is a bop.” I agree! Up next, Thomas Ades’s Darknesse Visible, based on lute music by John Dowland, was a fitting prelude to Ravel’s Gaspard de la Nuit. Cai’s mastery of repeated notes in the Ades was on full display, as the volume and timbre of each set of repeated notes was different – some requiring a delicate touch, others needing more aggression and percussiveness. In Gaspard, the shimmering quavers in Ondine were not as coolly executed as Evren Ozel, nor was his Le Gibet as viscerally creepy, but Cai provided one of the best Scarbo interpretations of the competition. Unfortunately, and surprisingly, he was not picked to go to the finals.

After a 40 minute wait, the six finalists were announced:

Carter Johnson, Canada/United States
Philipp Lynov, Russia
Evren Ozel, United States
Aristo Sham, Hong Kong China
Vitaly Starikov, Israel/Russia
Angel Stanislav Wang, United States

Gallery: Six Finalists

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My prediction during the interlude included Johnson, Ozel, and Sham, but the other three ranged from understanding to complete surprise. Wang was on my bubble. There’s no denying his ability to communicate with an audience and bring the bravura, but I just wasn’t sure if his shaky semifinal performances might cost him a finals appearance. Evidently the judges let him through based on aptitude more than actual results, which I think is fair. Lynov I have never been totally sold on, but his semifinal recital was revelatory, and upon reflection I think he deserves his spot. Starikov is the only finalist I’m not so sure about. I thought his Mozart concerto was underwhelming and his semifinal recital was uneven, particularly his Chopin etudes. But his spot in the finals means we’re going to see a Bartok Piano Concerto No. 2 at the Cliburn, which is quite something! Good luck to the orchestra getting that prepared on a tight schedule…!

Let’s also address the elephant in the room, and that is the fact that all six finalists are male. Only 4 of the 28 performers invited to Fort Worth were female to begin with, but all four were fabulous performers. We’ve already talked about Magdelene Ho’s apparent snub after the preliminary round. Alice Burla was a borderline case, but I would’ve loved to see her make it to the semifinals at least. Yanjun Chen was, as I’ve written about, a compelling musician but likely too unseasoned to warrant a finals appearance. But Chaeyoung Park – man, I don’t quite get her exclusion from the finals. I thought her Hammerklavier was a step up from Aristo Sham’s, and her Mozart concerto was sublime. We don’t know how the judges came to these decisions, and we have to respect their process, but I can’t help but wonder about the optics of an all-male final round.

Speaking of the finals, they begin Tuesday night, and run through Saturday (with an off day on Thursday, presumably to give everyone a slight breather). Tomorrow we’ll have a look at all ten concertos the six performers will bring to the stage, courtesy of Osip Nikiforov, who’s played most of them himself! It’ll be a fascinating finals: only ONE Rachmaninoff and ONE Tchaikovsky, plus some oddball competition choices like Bartok 2, Ravel’s Left Hand Concerto, Schumann, and Mendelssohn are all coming up. More to come!

Sunday, June 1

Semifinals, Day Four

by Joe Goetz

Semifinal recitals, Saturday afternoon

Up first on Saturday was Vitaly Starikov, who opened with an uneven account of Chopin’s Twelve Etudes, Op. 25. I’m not sure if it was the microphone placement or a conscious choice on Starikov’s part, but I found the melody in the first etude to be buried in the sea of cascading arpeggios. In general, Starikov seemed to approach most of the etudes with caution, but also with a keen sense of narrative. It wasn’t until he arrived at the final three etudes that he unleashed more firepower, which is essential to get through them. I did, however, find the last etude to be too fast, as if Starikov was trying to prove something that wasn’t necessary to be proven. After a short Schubert-Liszt transcription, he closed with Prokofiev’s Piano Sonata No. 7, which had me concerned given the rather tentative performance of the Chopin that preceded it. But Starikov proved up to the task, opting for less than breakneck speed in the finale but still plenty of momentum. Enough for him to make the finals? My sense is no, but we’ll see.

Carter Johnson was next, and most of his hour was devoted to the Schumann at his most wild and bizarre in the Davidsbundlertanze, Op. 6. Eighteen vignettes depicting Schumann’s opposing personalities, Florestan and Eusebius, it can cause whiplash for the listener if not performed well, and thankfully Johnson saved everyone’s necks. Schumann still confuses the heck out of me sometimes, but it was an enjoyable account. After Scriabin’s bizarrely colorful Five preludes, Op. 74, he closed with a piece that was new to me, Paul Hindemith’s Piano Sonata No. 3. I had no idea what to expect, having very limited knowledge of Hindemith’s piano music, but I loved it. The best way I could describe it is if Brahms and Scriabin decided to combine their powers. It was yet another example of the vivid programming mind Carter Johnson possesses, and I would be shocked if he’s not a finalist.

Semifinal concertos, Saturday night

I said in my previous update that I couldn’t’ imagine Friday evening’s concertos being topped, and I was right.  Saturday’s slate was a downgrade overall, but each performer had their moments. And one in particular stood head and shoulders above all the Mozart in the entire competition. The power rankings are thus:

No. 4: Yanjun Chen, Piano Concerto No. 23 in A Major, K. 488
Yanjun had to come through in a big way following the disappointment of her semifinal recital, and I don’t think her Mozart concerto did the trick. Odd voicing and phrasing, an aggressive first entrance, and some occasional sloppiness did her no favors. That said, I still admire the heck out of her as an artist. She marches to the beat of her own drummer, and even though I doubt she’ll make the finals, she’s going to be fun to watch as she continues her career.

No. 3: Jonas Aumiller, Piano Concerto No. 27 in B-flat Major, K. 595
Jonas Aumiller continues to churn out nearly note-perfect and painstakingly well-thought-out performances, but in this case it felt more as if I was reading a textbook about Mozart’s 27th concerto than actually listening to it. I didn’t sense the same deep level of engagement with the orchestra and the varieties of color that Piotr Alexewicz provided the night before, and even the orchestra didn’t seem to be as excited about it. For the opposite take, please check out Jed Distler’s Cliburn Blog, as he makes the case for Aumiller over Alexewicz. Chacun son gout!

No. 2: Angel Stanislav Wang, Piano Concerto No. 20 in D Minor, K. 466
Angel Stanislav Wang’s take-no-prisoners style is the perfect match for the darkness and drama in Mozart’s D Minor Concerto. At the risk of tooting my own horn, I was struck by how much he played it like I did (or how I wish I had, ha) back when I was in college a million years ago. He even flubbed the same passages in the development section that I did, and used the same well-loved Beethoven cadenzas. At the very end, he inexplicably accelerated, causing a brief moment of humorous chaos with the orchestra. Wang has big feelings when he plays, and when it works, it’s amazing. When it doesn’t, though, he gets into trouble. He’s on my final round bubble for now…we’ll see.

No. 1: Evren Ozel, Piano Concerto No. 25 in C Major, K. 503
I was waiting all week for this one. Having watched Evren’s previous rounds, I could think of no better concerto for him to tackle in the Mozart phase than this exact one. And he delivered 100% and then some. Smiles were on his menu, which were shared by conductor Carlos Miguel Prieto, and most of the members of the orchestra whose faces were visible to the livestream cameras. Ozel wrote his own cadenza for the first movement, which was magnificent. His ovation was the loudest of the entire Mozart portion of the competition, and he just may have punched his ticket to the finals.

It's Sunday evening and I’m about to sit down to watch the last of the semifinal recitals. More on those, plus a list of the six finalists, coming tomorrow.

Saturday, May 31

Semifinals, Day Three

by Joe Goetz

Day Three of the Cliburn semifinals featured two more solo recitals and then a set of Mozart piano concertos that is going to be hard to top. Of course, I say this now, early on a Saturday morning, and I suppose tonight’s slate of concertos could be even better, but that would be a very tall order.

Semifinal recitals, Friday afternoon

Yanjun Chen of China was the afternoon’s first competitor, opening with the Ballade No. 2 in F, Op. 38 by Frederic Chopin. Now, before I say anything else, I will say that Yanjun has been one of the most fiery players in the competition this far. She amps everything up to the max, and until this point, it has paid dividends, as it’s been pretty apparent she’s an audience favorite. Unfortunately, after taking corners on two wheels, she lost control of the car during this Chopin. Her Ballade was off the rails, and although she was able to rein it back in a bit during the beautiful Etude Op. 10, No. 3, the damage had been done. I could see the look of weary disappointment on her face before she did quite the job recombobulating herself for Schumann’s epic Kreisleriana. The Schumann was outstanding by comparison, full of the wild emotional swings that make his music so enchanting. He and Yanjun would’ve gotten along quite well, I think. She concluded with another Chopin etude, bowed to her adoring audience, and walked off stage looking forlorn. She’s a hell of a compelling artist, but I’m not sure she’ll make it to the finals after all those unforced errors.

Evren Ozel, YourClassical’s hometown guy, was next. After a colorful Les jeux d’eaux à la Ville d’Este by Franz Liszt, Evren stayed in the water for Ravel’s Gaspard de la Nuit. The opening movement, Ondine (the water sprite), was a masterclass in quiet control, and the second movement, Le gibet, was the most creepily haunting version in the competition so far. Scarbo, however, was a different story. Now, I should be clear that we’re talking about one of the most difficult pieces for the piano ever written, but Evren never looked quite comfortable with it. A few flubbed notes and muddy repeated notes at the outset threatened to derail his performance, but he recovered admirably as the movement went on. His strongest part of the recital was yet to come, Beethoven’s monumental Piano Sonata No. 32 in C Minor, Op. 111. This piece is pure ahead-of-his-time late Beethoven, and Evren was in his element. The variations in the work’s final movement steal the show, and Evren took some pretty brisk tempos (especially in the “boogie woogie” variation, as I like to call it), but at no point were any of his tempo choices in poor taste. The whole performance was clear, cool, and calculated. If Evren moves on to the final round, I would guess that Beethoven is his ticket.

Semifinal concertos, Friday night

We were treated to a smorgasbord of Mozart last night: four concertos in about two and a half hours, and everyone was on their game. That includes the amazing Fort Worth Symphony conducted by Carlos Miguel Prieto, who seemed to be having more fun than anyone else. I think what made the evening so special is that each pianist seemed to pick a concerto that was a perfect match for their personalities and musical strengths. Let’s get into these concertos, using the same Power Ranking format from the last recap.

No. 4: Elia Cecino, Piano Concerto No. 24 in C Minor, K. 491
Elia was the second pianist of the evening’s concerto wave, and although he’s last in my power rankings, that doesn’t mean he wasn’t good. It’s just a reflection of how amazing the night was overall. Elia’s performance was full of brawn, which is just what’s required of this concerto, the only one of Mozart’s piano concertos to feature the full complement of winds as well as timpani. It’s a precursor to Beethoven, and Elia treated it as such. At times it seemed like he got a little ahead of the orchestra, but I’m willing to let that slide given the compressed rehearsal schedule of the competition.

No. 3: Aristo Sham, Piano Concerto No. 23 in A Major, K. 488
I have in my notes from Aristo’s performance just one word: “perfect.” So what’s he doing third in the rankings? Well, I had no idea how awesome the rest of the night would be. And Sham’s performance was pretty darn perfect, with gorgeous articulation and phrasing througout, soulful mourning in the slow movement, and just the right amount of opera buffa in the finale. It would’ve been the best part of the night in any other situation, but everyone last night was just that good.

No. 2: Yangrui Cai, Piano Concerto No. 25 in C major, K. 503
It is truly a tossup between Yangrui Cai and Aristo Sham, but I have to give Yangrui the slightest of edges just because the technical demands of Mozart’s 25th concerto are just that much higher than those in the 23rd. His performance was declarative from the get-go, and he earned few bonus points with the Cliburn faithful by choosing cadenzas by 2017 Cliburn silver medalist Kenny Broberg.

No. 1: Piotr Alexewicz, Piano Concerto No. 27 in B-flat major, K. 595
Words escape me in attempting to describe this transcendent performance. Written five years (or more) after the other Mozart concertos heard to this point, there’s a more romantic sensibility and lush veneer to the piece than its predecessors, even though the size of the orchestra is smaller than, say, the very large 24th concerto. Mozart’s harmonic language is also far more complex, as he explores keys far distant from the home key of B-flat major. Piotr reveled in all of this, and as a Chopin pianist at heart, completely leaned into the textures that, had Mozart lived longer, might have evolved into a more Chopinesque sound. This was a performance I and others won’t soon forget. Bravo.

Friday, May 30

Semifinals, Day Two

by Joe Goetz

Day Two of the Cliburn semifinals featured two more solo recitals plus our first Mozart concertos of the competition – which gives me the chance to shout out the heroic Fort Worth Symphony. My goodness, those folks are incredible. Rehearsing multiple Mozart concerti, in a slimmed down chamber version of themselves, and performing live on a worldwide web stream…that is pressure! Next week will be even more nuts for the orchestra. Hats off to them!

Semifinal recitals, Thursday afternoon

The two solo recitals from yesterday were a study in polar opposite styles. Up first was Angel Stanislav Wang, who opened with a ferocious performance of Beethoven’s Appassionata Sonata. I got the sense quite early in this piece that it wasn’t really in his wheelhouse, but he sure sold it, as imperfect as his performance was. I truly hate being a rookie officer in the Wrong Note Police, but there were lots of them. Will his tenacious interpretation overcome his wildness to impress the judges? We won’t know until Sunday night. After Beethoven were some Bolcom etudes that didn’t keep my attention, followed by a complete Pictures at an Exhibition by Modest Mussorgsky. Wang approached the stately Promenade with the same aggressiveness that he brought to the Beethoven, but he left room for fun and whimsy, especially in the Ballet of the Unhatched Chicks, which was delightful. All in all, it was a convincing survey of Pictures, albeit risky like the Beethoven, so we’ll see if he makes it to the finals.

Germany’s Jonas Aumiller was next, and it was immediately apparent that his style is the anti-Wang. He opened with the Bach-Busoni Organ prelude and Fugue in D, BWV 532, and I was impressed with his control of the cascading left hand octaves that masked just how virtuosic the piece truly is. The six Klavierstucke, Op. 118 of Brahms were next, and Aumiller’s ability to shift deftly from the rhapsodic A major Intermezzo (No. 2) to the brittle intensity of the G minor Ballade (No. 3) was captivating. The Romanze in F major (No. 5) I’d add to our Sleep Stream (shameless plug!) in a heartbeat. After the last work, an Intermezzo in E-flat minor, Aumiller moved on without pause to Chopin’s Impromptu No. 2 in F-sharp major, Op. 36. Aha, another perfect key signature segue for your boy here (F-sharp major is de facto the relative major of E-flat minor, please music theory nerds don’t bother me about the enharmonic details I’m leaving out). Aumiller closed his recital with his own transcription of Liszt’s symphonic poem Les Preludes. Aumiller’s mimicry of Liszt’s piano techniques was spot on, down to the uber-cool octave glissandos in both hands. I just wish he had chosen one of Liszt’s more interesting symphonic poems to transcribe, as I have always found Les Preludes to be a fantastically mundane piece of music. Thankfully Aumiller’s performance of it was anything but sedate.

As the field will be cut in half prior to the finals, I have to wonder which of these two the judges would choose. Both offer world class virtuosity, one with high-wire drama and action, the other with refined restraint. I should clarify that thought, however - the judges will cut the whole field in half, not every pair of hour-long recitals each day. So they both might make it, or they both might not. We’ll have to wait and see.

Semifinal Concertos, Thursday night

Let’s try something a little different for these, rather than a straight recap. I’m going to offer my Mozart Concerto Power Rankings for the four pianists who performed last night, in order from my least favorite to most. It’s important to note, though, that a) all four pianists were outstanding, and b) their performances are even more remarkable given the relative lack of rehearsal time. Such is the nature of big competitions…

No. 4: Philipp Lynov, Piano Concerto No. 9 in E-flat, K. 271
This is one of Mozart’s more unusual piano concertos in that the piano enters only a bar into the piece. Although brief orchestra tutti is marked forte, there’s not a specific dynamic marking for this piano entrance, which is usually played assertively, yet delicately. Lynov opted for the assertive side of the spectrum with his entrance, which startled me a bit. The rest of his performance was milk-and-potatoes Mozart through and through – nothing remarkable, nothing negative.

No. 3: Vitaliy Starikov, Piano Concerto No. 23 in A, K. 488
One of the most popular Mozart concertos, K. 488 is a roller coaster of drama and humor. Its opening movement unfolds unsurprisingly, but the Adagio in the middle is full of despair. The third movement, however, is a comic opera masquerading as a piano concerto. Starikov captured the emotional essences of these movements with aplomb, and his occasional smiles throughout conveyed an infectious enjoyment. His articulation was superb, almost to a fault. I found his phrasing to be a tad brittle, especially in moments that were supposed to be more bel canto. But it was still a spirited account of one of my favorites.

No. 2: Chaeyoung Park, Piano Concerto No. 20 in D minor, K. 466
My absolute favorite Mozart concerto (and the only one I’ve ever played myself, so I’m likely very biased), Park gave a positively operatic account of one of only two concertos Mozart wrote in a minor key. Liberal use of pedal, freedom with tempos, long and flowing phrases, and her usage of cadenzas by Robert Levin may not have appealed to all, but they aligned with my own conception of the piece. I only wish I could’ve played it as well as she did.

No. 1: Carter Johnson, Piano Concerto No. 22 in E-flat, K. 482
Before we get to Carter, I have to talk up the winds in the Fort Worth Symphony in this performance. Stellar work, folks. Just beautiful. As for Carter, he showed yet another side of his mature musicianship. After early round recitals featuring Bartok and Prokofiev, hearing his Mozart was a revelation. It was the perfect marriage of classical sensibility and romantic drama. I loved his ornaments, and his milking of the final movement’s drama (it contains a quasi-slow movement with it) was boatloads of fun to watch. High marks alla round.

More solo recitals, and four more concertos, coming later today!  Recap tomorrow.

Thursday, May 29

The Semifinals are Underway

by Joe Goetz

Last night, the semifinals of the 2025 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition began with just two pianists giving their solo recitals. The next four days will be a LOT busier, with recitals each afternoon, then Mozart concertos with the Forth Worth Symphony in the evening. For this round, the twelve remaining pianists will perform an hour-long solo recital, as well as a Mozart concerto from a list curated by the Cliburn. Let’s get to a recap of last night’s relatively brief session:

Up first was Hong Kong’s Aristo Sham, who took a big risk in the quarterfinals with Beethoven’s Hammerklavier Sonata. Aristo began his semifinal recital with Rachmaninoff’s arrangement of several movements from Bach’s Violin Partita No. 3. The voicing of counterpoint in the opening Preludio was exquisite, as were the sparkling leaps in the Gavotte, and the perfectly even runs in the Giga. After a trill-filled and rather spacy (but that’s the point!) Piano Sonata No. 10 by Alexander Scriabin, Aristo returned to long-form programming with a complete survey of Rachmaninoff’s nine Etudes-Tableaux, Op. 39. The challenge with these works is to not simply treat them as exercises (hence the “Etudes” part of the title), but to also paint pictures with the music. In fact, at least two of these works are directly inspired by paintings. Aristo accomplished this quite well, although I did have one minor quibble about dynamics. I felt that at times his soft parts were not soft enough, making the many climaxes in these works less effective. In the middle of the 5th Etude-Tableau, there’s a quiet and foreboding stretch that I personally love to hear as quiet as possible, which makes the thunderous chromatic ascent back to the giant dominant seventh heralding the return of the main theme much more powerful. Aristo seemed to keep this section at more of a mezzo piano, which didn’t allow him enough room to grow. Similarly, the march-like final Etude-tableau has a pretty long build-up to its final flourish, and I thought Aristo began this part too loudly, which made him really push hard at the end, resulting in a rather obvious (but forgivable) sour note in the work’s final bars. But, again, these are minor quibbles, and his spirited performance will likely be a highlight of this round.

Going next (and last) was Italy’s Elia Cecino. I’ve had my doubts about Elia, but he’s gotten stronger each round, and that trend continued last night. A placid Tchaikovsky nocturne opened his program, followed by another sonata in the key of F-sharp minor. In the previous round, Cecino played Scriabin’s Piano Sonata No. 3, and in this round he chose Schumann’s Piano Sonata No. 1. Aside from their shared key signature, I couldn’t help but contemplate the connections between these two otherwise disparate composers. Both explored wildly opposing personalities in their music, and both were often misunderstood by their contemporaries and by subsequent generations of musicians. Cecino’s performance of this sprawling sonata by Schumann was full of personality, though I admit I still have a very hard time understanding the work. I actually pulled out the score and was looking at it in bed last night (my wife thought I was nuts), and it’s even wilder than I remember the last time I looked at it. Anyway, after the Schumann, Cecino offered one of the most perfect programmatic choices of the competition so far, playing Sofia Gubaidulina’s Toccata-troncata as a prelude, without pause, to Prokofiev’s Piano Sonata No. 7. What can be said about this incredible work, Prokofiev’s de facto middle finger to Stalin, that hasn’t already been written? His performance built in energy and anger, sweat pouring off his brow, bringing the work’s final movement (marked Precipitato) to a thrilling conclusion.

If last night was any indication, the judges are going to have a nearly impossible task cutting the current field in half. Every remaining competitor is world-class, so there will be plenty of heartbreak to go with the jubilation. More later!

Tuesday, May 27

Listen to a Teenaged Evren Ozel!

by Joe Goetz

As I mentioned in a previous post, we at YourClassical are based in Minnesota, thus we’re all very excited about Minneapolis native Evren Ozel’s participation in the 2025 Cliburn and his ascent to the ranks of the semifinalists. Let’s turn the clock back eleven years to 2014, when a 15-year-old Ozel was a participant in MPR’s Minnesota Varsity, showcasing young musical talent from across the state. On an April afternoon that year, he wowed the audience at the Fitzgerald Theater (and the thousands listening to their radios to the live broadcast) with this performance of Prokofiev. Enjoy!

Monday, May 26

Quarterfinals + Looking Ahead to the Semis

by Joe Goetz and Osip Nikiforov

It was a weekend to remember at the 2025 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition. A surprise withdrawal, some controversial decisions, and of course, a boatload of stellar playing leaves us a LOT to talk about on this Memorial Day. The quarterfinals offer competitors a simple choice: Do they use their next 40-minute recital to double down on the types of music and performances that earned them their spot, or do they switch gears and try to show the judges (and the audience) a different side of themselves? There’s no right or wrong answer to this question. Big thanks to my intern Osip Nikiforov for writing up the Sunday morning and Sunday afternoon recitals, as I was taking a much-needed Cliburn break on the golf course, soaking in the absolutely perfect 72-degree Minnesota sunshine, and taking some much-needed dollars off my buddies (sorry, guys, better luck next time). Anyway, let’s get into it!

Quarterfinal Recital No. 1, Saturday afternoon
(recap from Joe)

The quarterfinals began, quite literally, in fantasyland, with Shangru Du of China. Beethoven’s Fantasia, Op. 77 and Scriabin’s Fantasy in B Minor were followed by Rachmaninoff’s Polichinelle from the Morceaux de Fantasie, Op. 3. Wrapping up his program was what has apparently become this Cliburn’s “gotta do it” selection, Liszt’s Dante Sonata. The Beethoven and Scriabin were solid, but things started to go off the rails with several imprecise moments in the Rachmaninoff. Du’s Liszt was similarly plagued, and when combined with his conservative approach to the piece, it left me concerned about his chances. Those concerns ended up being well-founded, as Du was not one of the 12 contestants moving on to the semifinals.

Up next was one of the more shocking moments I’ve witnessed in a major music competition. Xiaofu Ju, also from China, took the stage and sat at the piano. He then looked deeply at his hands, got up, took a bow, and left the stage as the concerned audience murmured anxiously. The competition would soon announce Ju’s withdrawal, citing “health concerns.” No details were ever provided beyond that, and it was a heartbreaking end of Ju’s competition. We wish him well!

Carter Johnson, representing Canada and the United States, then took the stage after an hour break (the schedule had assumed Ju would do a 40-minute recital, plus a 20-minute recess following). He was one of my favorites from the first round, and in his second round he reminded me why, choosing the “double down” approach to his programming. Four selections from Brahms’s Klavierstucke, Op. 76 were placed between two sets of preludes by Dmitri Shostakovich. He concluded his recital with the otherworldly Piano Sonata by Bela Bartok. The thing with Bartok is that you either love him or hate him, and though I admit this sonata is not the kind of music I’d listen to for pleasure (or likely ever program for the radio), the colors and timbres Johnson produced were undeniably compelling. I was transfixed, and I was both unsurprised and elated to see his name called as a semifinalist late on Sunday evening.

I didn’t think Johnson could be topped, but then I heard David Khrikuli of Georgia. More Brahms was on his menu, the complete Fantasien, Op. 116, followed by yet another Liszt Dante Sonata. Khrikuli immediately reminded me, just by his manner onstage, let alone his playing, of the “old school” of Russian pianists. I texted Osip and said, “This guy is downright Gilelsian.” His Brahms opened with a remarkable depth of sonority, but then I also said to myself “What is he going to do with the E major Op. 116/4?” I wasn’t disappointed, as he ascended from the depths of what had come before into an unbelievably peaceful and heavenly calm. His Liszt that followed set the standard, as far as I was concerned, for that piece and its place in this competition. He was a shoe-in for the semifinals — or so I thought. More on that later.

Quarterfinal Recital No. 2, Saturday evening
(recap from Joe)

There are many kinds of courage: jumping out an an airplane, speaking truth to power, and — maybe the most courageous of all — playing Beethoven’s Hammerklavier Sonata in the second round of a major international piano competition (wink wink). Aristo Sham of Hong Kong, China, did just that. It’s a monumental feat of strength and endurance to get through this work, and Sham didn’t just get through it, he actually seemed to build strength throughout it. The centerpiece of the work is its third movement, Adagio sostenuto, which the writer Wilhelm von Lenz called “a mausoleum of collective sorrow.” Sham took his time through this movement, so much time that I was concerned he would go over the 40-minute mark. But no worries — he launched into the sonata’s closing fugue with raw firepower, plowing through it while maintaining its elaborate structure. At the end, he looked weary? Relieved? Likely both. He’s moving on to the semis.

The stage was then set for American Angel Stanislav Wang, who brought a whole other kind of firepower (literally). After opening with a work that more traditionally closes many recitals, Ravel’s La Valse, Wang spent his next 15 minutes or so exploring seemingly all the colorful possibilities the modern piano can offer through a set of Debussy preludes. The last of these was the explosive Feux d’artifice (“Fireworks”), which was a fitting segue into his grand finale, Guido Agosti’s transcription of Igor Stravinsky’s ballet The Firebird. I had never seen this performed live before, and it was jaw-dropping. After its conclusion, as the audience in Fort Worth was giving Wang a raucous ovation, my son who was sitting next to me on the couch simply said “How…?” I don’t know, buddy, but I do know now that Wang is on to the semifinals.

Finally, Philipp Lynov of Russia offered us a taste of his homeland with the Prelude and Fugue in G-sharp Minor, Op. 29 by Sergei Taneyev. Do yourself a favor and read about Taneyev’s relationship with Tchaikovsky; it’s fascinating. Anyway, this thick, complex music was well executed in Lynov’s hands, but I can’t say the same for his Piano Sonata No. 1 in F-sharp Minor, Op. 11 by Robert Schumann. Schumann is always problematic, as his music doesn’t always feel organic to the hands, and even if you are able to untangle the technical challenges, you then have to figure out how to interpret it. There were some unfortunate errors in Lynov’s performance, but I think he handled it as well as could be expected. He’ll be moving on, although I have some thoughts about that later.

Quarterfinal Recital No. 3, Sunday morning
(recap from Osip)

Sunday morning’s session was opened by Jonas Aumiller, Germany. His thunderous yet poetic Liszt’s Saint François de Paule marchant sur les flots was just what the doctor ordered on a crisp Sunday morning. It was also the first time this work was heard at the competition. As we started immersing ourselves in Debussy’s Feux d'artifice from Préludes, Book II, maybe because of the complete musical language change, I didn’t quite feel enough that we were in the sumptuous world of the impressionist master composer. Beethoven’s monumental last piano sonata followed, bringing the pianist back to his element. While it was very well executed, I felt this sonata lacked the exact monumentality that it is all about. Overall, a very solid performance by Jonas.

Up next, Mikhail Kambarov, Russia, took the stage. It was certainly a bold choice of programming that caught my eye. Le baiser de l'Enfant-Jésus from Vingt Regards sur l'Enfant-Jésus by Messiaen is very rarely programmed in competitions. It was quite the spiritual experience hearing this work on a Sunday morning, and though Mikhail played it beautifully, I am just not sure if this was a wise programming choice for the quarterfinals. The same Beethoven sonata was played back to back — this time opening with much more gravitas, setting up the pulse of the work from the get-go. After hearing Mikhail play this work, I couldn’t stop thinking how the spirituality of this work was indeed well transferred from the Messiaen, perhaps, after all making the whole round’s program very organic.

After the brief intermission, Piotr Alexewicz, Poland, started his quarterfinal round with the famed Pour le piano by Debussy, bringing different tone qualities and their respective colors, which this work is full of, with a wonderful sense of musical “time”. His Six Pieces for Piano by Ottorino Respighi was equally convincing with elaborate voicing and beautiful touch. The same personal sense of musical “time” was fully on display here as well. As musical as the Prokofiev Piano Sonata No. 3 was, I personally thought it lacked a bit of a bite and angularity (in a good sense of the word) that this work is full of. That being said, he strongly placed (or should I say played) himself into the contention for the semis.

The last competitor of the morning session, Alice Burla of Canada, took the stage with the self-asserting Sonata in G Minor, H. 47 by C.P.E. Bach. Generally speaking, C.P.E. Bach is one of those composers who needs special interpretive powers from the performer to make his music truly make sense or even be cohesive. I think Alice succeeded in that by bringing the needed improvisational freedom needed in this sonata. A very lovely contrast of Nocturne No. 6 in D-flat Major by Fauré followed, which felt to me like very personal storytelling. As interesting as the Variations on a Polish Folk Theme by Szymanowski were, from my own competition experience, I felt the program needed something a little more “known”, considering the previous two works. This all could prove to be a stepping stone, though, I hope to be wrong.

Quarterfinal Recital No. 4, Sunday afternoon
(recap from Osip)

The afternoon session was opened by Yanjun Chen of China, with Mozart’s Sonata No. 10 in C Major. I could tell she was enjoying herself very much in this work, and it showed — beautifully shaped lines, an array of varying articulation, and tons of playfulness visually and audibly. That feeling of “planned” spontaneity transferred to Debussy with a wide palette of colors in spades. Her last piece on the program, Medtner’s Sonata tragica, though played very energetically — “turning it up” as described by the Cliburn commentators — some sections were taken, perhaps, a tad bit too fast, resulting in evoking some imagery other than “tragic”. Nevertheless, Yanjun will always have a following, regardless of how this competition unfolds for her.

Next, American Jonathan Mamora, whom I personally know very well, took the stage with a palate cleanser in the form of Mozart’s Adagio in B minor, which was played soulfully and delicately. The next piece — Liszt’s Sonata in B minor — although written in the same key of B minor, started, of course, with the famous two G’s, from which Jonathan was completely immersed in the world of Faust and Mephistopheles. As he went on, I felt that the majority of the sonata lacked the overall dramaticism in the dark Mephistopheles-esque parts. That being said, I did enjoy his recitatives and more reflective parts of the sonata. A performance of this sonata at a competition of any level is always a feat, and I respect and admire him for bringing this sonata to this edition of the Cliburn.

For the last batch of the afternoon session performers, it was a nice warm feeling to see the Minnesota native, Evren Ozel, come onto the stage and begin his recital with a very bouncy and dance-like Bartok Out of Doors, including lots of nature sound effects in “The Night Music.” It was very captivating! The main fare in his program, though, was Schumann’s Humoreske — a piece that is loaded with traps both interpretational, conceptual, as well as purely technical (I can personally attest to that, having performed that piece myself many times). Evren handled this piece with mastery and confidence of a seasoned performer, which he certainly is. I loved how he managed to hold this piece all tight together despite its very nature of sectionality.

Chaeyoung Park, South Korea, wrapped up the afternoon session starting with Stravinsky-Agosti’s Firebird, and oh boy, was that bird on fire! Debussy’s Général Lavine – eccentric was played very convincingly and wittily. Le baiser de l'Enfant-Jésus by Messiaen, although another piece by a French composer of the 20th century, felt more organic and “at home” for the pianist in my opinion. The final course in an already heavy meal was none other than Brahms’s Variations on a theme of Paganini, Book II. This was played with a boldness and drive this music deserves yet still elegant and musical. This was a very fitting end to the afternoon session.

Quarterfinal Recital No. 5, Sunday evening
(recap from Joe)

Elia Cecino of Italy led off the last of the quarterfinal recitals with Joseph Haydn’s Sonata in E Minor, Hob. XVI:34. It was a spirited performance, but something about it nagged at me, like Cecino didn’t actually enjoy it himself. Mendelssohn’s Variations sérieuses, op. 54 followed, one of my favorites. Yet Cecino seemed tentative in his performance, and I felt that he missed a lot of the work’s dramatic arc. He then switched gears to Scriabin, with the rarely heard Sonata No. 3 in F-Sharp minor, Op. 23. From the first notes, it was if the weight of the world was lifted from Cecino’s shoulders, as if this was what he was meant to play all along. It started wobbly to my ears, but quickly he found his stride, and by the end I was very impressed. He’s moving on, and I have to guess it’s solely on the basis of that Scriabin, and not the two works that came before it.

China’s Yangrui Cai was next, offering us more Scriabin (the Fantasy in B minor again), then Liszt’s Bénédiction de Dieu dans la solitude, which is one of the most personal offerings the great piano master left us. Cai played it beautifully, although a bit impersonally (to me). Just a matter of taste is all. Anyway, he concluded with Three Movements from Petruskha by Igor Stravinsky, always a wild crowd-pleaser, and he seemed right at home with its constant barrage of leaps, repeated notes, and shifting colors. He’s a semifinalist.

Finally, Vitaly Starikov served up a Mozart Allegro, which was the perfect warmup for Liszt’s Les jeux d'eaux à la Villa d'Este. I have rarely heard such quiet precision in the high-register filigrees in the right hand. Starikov wrapped his recital with Schumann’s Symphonic Etudes, which is basically a glorified set of variations on a brooding chorale theme. That brooding turns to unbridled exuberance in the finale, and the whole journey was flawless from start to finish. Vitaly is also a semifinalist.

We only had to wait about 35 minutes for the jury to announce the complete list of semifinalists:

Piotr Alexewicz, Poland
Jonas Aumiller, Germany
Yangrui Cai, China
Elia Cecino, Italy
Yanjun Chen, China
Carter Johnson, Canada/United States
Philipp Lynov, Russia
Evren Ozel, United States
Chaeyoung Park, South Korea
Aristo Sham, Hong Kong China
Vitaly Starikov, Israel/Russia
Angel Stanislav Wang, United States

Now, about David Khrikuli. I was not alone in my shock to see his name left off this list. His performances were more than solid, full of brains, brawn, and heart. And they all had a level of technical mastery that was, in my opinion, at the high end of the spectrum we’ve seen so far in the competition. Alice Burla is another name I am surprised to see omitted. Perhaps her imaginative programming (Haydn/Ligeti/Barer in the first round, C.P.E. Bach/Faure/Szymanowski in the quarters) was just too out there for the judges? We may never know. I told myself when I started this blog that I’d try to refrain from anything that smacks of “I would’ve done this” or “I wouldn’t have done that,” but given the uneven performances of Elia Cecino and Philipp Lynov, I have a hard time understanding why they get to move on and David and Alice do not. BUT — at the end of the day — every one of these people are fantastic pianists, and no matter the result, they should hold their heads high. At the very least, we now know their names, and we can follow them and support them no matter what happens next.

What happens next at the Cliburn are the semifinals, which begin on Wednesday evening. Each of the remaining performers will play one hourlong recital, plus a Mozart piano concerto with the Fort Worth Symphony as the competition changes venues to Bass Hall, the Symphony’s home. Until then, enjoy the last hours of Memorial Day weekend.

Saturday, May 24

Preliminary Round, Day 3 + Who’s Moving On

by Joe Goetz

I’ve got to keep this update as brief as possible today due to various weekend plans, including a honey-do list that’s a mile long. We’ll take a look at the last recitals of the preliminary round and reveal who’s moving on (and who isn’t) to the quarterfinals, which begin in a very short time this afternoon. 

Preliminary Recital No. 7

First up on Friday morning was Evren Ozel. Full disclosure: I and others at YourClassical are quietly rooting for Evren because we are based in Minnesota, and Evren grew up in Minneapolis. The last Minnesota contestant in the Cliburn was Kenny Broberg in 2017, and he went on to medal. In any event, my potential bias aside, Evren showed up with a near-perfect Partita No. 5 by J.S. Bach, the required Montero, and a masterfully controlled Rachmaninoff Corelli Variations. He’ll be moving on, unlike the Timberwolves, who seem to be done for. Up next was South Korea’s Sung Ho Yoo, who I thought brought the best Rachmaninoff Piano Sonata No. 2 the competition had seen so far, but he was one of the unfortunate 10 voted off Cliburn Island at the end of the night. Another South Korean, Chaeyoung Park, wrapped up the morning’s recitals with the quietest opening we’ve heard so far, Rachmaninoff’s G Major prelude, and ended with a frenzy in Prokofiev’s Piano Sonata No. 8. I was a little surprised to see such a large work in the competition’s opening round, and it seemed like a boom-or-bust proposition, but it turned out to be a boom. She’s moving on.

Preliminary Recital No. 8

The midafternoon action began with Spain’s Pedro Lopez Salas, who provided a daring opening work in Mozart’s Piano Sonata No. 10, K. 330. I don’t consider this to be a competition piece, but I have fond memories of my father playing through this work when I was younger, especially its tender slow movement. Perhaps Salas was paying homage to his fellow Spaniard Alicia de Larrocha (who recorded Mozart oh-so-brilliantly back in the day)? In any event, it was just fine, and he followed it after Rachtime with, as they’d say on Monty Python, something completely different: Alberto Ginastera’s Piano Sonata No. 1. The crowd loved it, but it wasn’t enough to move Salas to the next round.

Next, Japan’s Kotaro Shigemori opened with the late Chopin Nocturne in E, Op. 62/2, followed without pause by Scriabin’s Sonata No. 2. I’m a sucker for programming pieces linked together via harmony, and the E major to G-sharp minor transition made my music-theory heart sing. After Rachtime, Shigemori ended with Liszt’s Dante Sonata, which I found to be far more emotionally effective and technically sound than Piotr Alexewicz’s performance of the same work the previous day, but evidently the judges disagreed. Shigemori goes home, Alexewicz moves on.

Finally, Italy’s lone representative in the competition, Elia Cecino, began with a lighthearted Prelude and Fugue by Dmitri Shostakovich, and a similarly lighthearted Beethoven Piano Sonata No. 16 in G, Op. 31/1. I don’t follow the competition circuit regularly, but I can’t imagine this particular Beethoven sonata making regular appearances. Cecino played it well, then concluded with the Gounod-Liszt Faust Waltz. The gold standard for this piece, in my biased ears, is my buddy Di Wu’s performance from the 2009 Cliburn, and Cecino fell short of that. It seemed as if the sudden shift from the lighter fare with which he began threw him off balance a bit, but it was enough for him to move on to the next round, where apparently we’ll get to hear him play Prokofiev’s Piano Sonata No. 7. Just a bit different from Beethoven…! 

Preliminary Recital No. 9

Just two pianists in the evening wave. First up, China’s Yangrui Kai, who opened with Bach’s Toccata in D, BWV 912. I found the opening of this toccata to be a tad syrupy, with liberal use of pedal and lots of romantic-style liberties with phrasing and tempo. But in the back end, Kai deftly shifted gears into a much more “traditional” Bach sound, which by extension shifted my reaction from perplexed to delighted. After some bagatelles by the contemporary composer Carl Vine, Kai’s main event was the Liszt arrangement of the overture to Richard Wagner’s Tannhäuser. A tour de force of virtuosity, Kai thundered through it, perhaps getting a little too bangy at times for my liking, but his chops were undeniable. He’s moving on.

Finally, Vitaly Starikov, representing both Russia and Israel, opened with a rather watered-down version of Bach’s Toccata in F-sharp Minor, BWV 910. Usually this is my favorite of Bach’s toccatas, but the note I have written for myself is “meh.” Thankfully, that “meh” feeling quickly faded away with a spritely rendition of Chopin’s Scherzo No. 4 in E, Op. 54. The lightest of Chopin’s four scherzi, and the only one in a major key, Starikov brought whimsy to its outer sections and just the right amount of tender melancholy to the middle. Spot on. After Rachtime, Starikov brought us another Shostakovich Piano Sonata No. 1. I’ll admit my first thought was “Oh, no, not again,” but after hearing it in his hands, I found myself in a Brennan and Dale situation from the movie Stepbrothers: Did we just become best friends?? YUP! OK, so maybe I am still not in love with the piece, but Starikov’s excellent account of it changed my feelings quite a bit on it, which is the sure sign of a great artist. He’s moving on.

About an hour after the conclusion of the evening’s recitals, the 18 pianists moving on to the quarterfinals were announced:

Piotr Alexewicz, Poland
Jonas Aumiller, Germany
Alice Burla, Canada
Yangrui Cai, China
Elia Cecino, Italy
Yanjun Chen, China
Shangru Du, China
Carter Johnson, Canada/United States
Xiaofu Ju, China
Mikhail Kambarov, Russia
David Khrikuli, Georgia
Philipp Lynov, Russia
Jonathan Mamora, United States
Evren Ozel, United States
Chaeyoung Park, South Korea
Aristo Sham, Hong Kong China
Vitaly Starikov, Israel/Russia
Angel Stanislav Wang, United States

As with all competitions, there are great contestants that for, one reason or another, don’t move on. The big surprise for me (and others, judging by online comments and private correspondence I’ve had with those in the know) was the elimination of Malaysia’s Magdalene Ho. I just can’t understand it. I thought she was far more worthy than some others who moved on. Jed Distler, writing his own very excellent blog for Grammophone magazine, described his feelings on the issue as “enraging.” Jed and I chatted a bit this morning, and while I wouldn’t go as far as feeling enraged, I certainly understand the sentiment. Ho is only 21, and she can give the Cliburn another shot in four years, but this one still stings. I was also mildly surprised to see that Sung Ho Yoo didn’t make it, either. He brought so much poise and vigor to his Friday morning performance. But I’m not a judge (thankfully!).

Quarterfinals begin a few hours from this post (which is occurring around midday on Saturday). No posts until Monday, after the quarterfinals are over and the 12 semifinalists are announced. I’m just too busy this weekend to get a mid-round Sunday post done, and I’ll actually be having some help this weekend from my intern, Osip Nikiforov. Osip is a damn fine pianist (he wanted to audition for the Cliburn himself this year but barely missed the maximum age requirement) and a veteran of many international competitions himself, so I look forward to his perspective on some of Sunday’s performances, which I’ll have to miss due to [he says sheepishly] a golf outing. So, until Monday, have a great Memorial Day weekend. So much for brevity…!

Friday, May 23

Preliminary Round, Day 2

by Joe Goetz

Day 2 of the competition was a study in contrasts; several contestants chose programs that showcased wildly different sides of their musical personalities, and differences in interpretation among contestants choosing the same (or very similar) pieces made for fascinating viewing. On the whole, I found Day 2 to be a step down from Day 1 in terms of overall quality of playing and programming, but I suppose you could chalk that up to viewer fatigue. There were, however, lots of great moments to talk about, so let’s dive in.

Preliminary Recital No. 4

The morning began with German pianist Jonas Aumiller. The first word that pops to mind about his performance, to me, was “safe.” Or, perhaps, now that I’ve typed this, “restrained.” Aumiller began with the gorgeous Scriabin Fantasy, but his restraint seemed to temper the impulsiveness normally associated with Scriabin’s music. A solid Bach toccata and Chopin’s Barcarolle followed the Scriabin, and then his best performance was of Schumann’s rarely-heard Presto passionato, which seemed to best represent Aumiller’s style. Will Aumiller’s rejection of real bravura in his first round cost him? I have no idea.

Up next was Malaysian Magdalene Ho, who offered a much more colorful Bach toccata than Aumiller, followed by the intense and dark Prelude, Chorale, and Fugue by Cesar Franck. Her ability to shift emphasis deftly among the inner voices of both these works put her on plane above Aumiller, and her closing with Saint-Saens’ Étude en forme de valse was a playfully raucous taste of bravura that was just perfect. It may be premature, but I’ve got her on my Finals radar already.

Finally, Ukrainian Roman Fediurko opened his recital with some fairly pedestrian Bach, but after Gabriela Montero’s Rachtime, Fediurko decided it was, indeed, time to Rach, first with the Elegie from the composer’s youthful Morceaux de fantaisie, Op. 3, and then the epic Piano Sonata No. 2. Fediurko may be only 20, but he’s got that “Rachmaninoff sound,” a deep sonority that rumbles deep in your belly. I’m not sure if it’s enough for him, but even if it’s not, he’s got time to build on his experience at his age.

Preliminary Recital No. 5

My afternoon viewing was, admittedly, a bit distracted, as I was trying to do work at the same time. Russian Mikhail Kambarov played it safe with Chopin and Scarlatti, ending with a solid performance of Rachmaninoff’s Corelli Variations. Nothing stood out to me about his performance, either positive or negative.

British contestant Callum McLachlan was next, and he opted to begin his program with Schumann’s Waldszenen, an interesting choice for a competition. But his performance was more than worthy, especially the mysterious and lilting seventh movement, Prophetic Bird. He concluded with the second Samuel Barber sonata we’ve heard so far in the preliminary round, offering a more introspective interpretation than the brute force virtuosity we heard from Philipp Lynov the previous evening.

Following McLachlan was the day’s most (and I say this with no malice) bizarre recital, performed by Jiarui Cheng of China. As I said at the beginning of this update, today was a day of contrasts, and hoo boy, did Cheng’s program have plenty of those. After a Bach toccata to begin, he launched into the whiz-bang virtuosity of Vladimir Horowitz’s arrangement of Franz Liszt’s arrangement (yes, you read this right) of Saint-Saens’ Danse macabre. It’s a piece that exists solely for the purpose of wowing an audience, and Cheng certainly succeeded at doing just that. The musical whiplash continued with a Brahms Intermezzo in A, Op. 118/2. One of the last utterances of an aging and reluctant composer, I wanted to hear more vulnerability, but it felt wholly clinical in Cheng’s hands. Scriabin’s Piano Sonata No. 5 and Montero’s Rachtime rounded out his program, and Cheng seemed compelled to go for broke with both of them, amping the virtuosity up to 11, but I couldn’t help but feel a sense of emptiness from his playing, despite his obvious technical prowess.

Finally, Polish pianist Piotr Alexewicz offered us Brahms and Medtner before tackling Liszt’s Après une lecture du Dante, which started out great!...and then towards the end it felt as if he ran out of gas. Some pretty glaring errors occurred, as well as some muddy tremolo playing in the quieter moments, may have sunk his chances of advancing.

Preliminary Recital No. 6

The evening began with one of my favorite recitals so far. Canadian Alice Burla began with a sparkling Haydn sonata, which she followed with Ligeti’s fourth etude, “Fanfares.” Yes, our first Ligeti of the competition! A masterful bit of programming there, as the perpetual motion sparks of the Ligeti mirrored the crispness of her Haydn to absolute perfection. I did find her performance of Rachtime to be a bit on the uneasy side, but my reservations melted away quickly with her closing work, yet another interpretation of Samuel Barber’s sonata. This was the best of the bunch to date, as she allowed herself the room to build to the work’s many climaxes, making them even more powerful. I really hope she makes a deep run in the competition.

After Burla came Yanjun Chen of China, who also opened with Haydn, but she chose a sonata that didn’t really excite me. Its final movement, at least, had some Roma-flavored fun and games, but on the whole I thought it was kind of a throwaway selection. In contrast, her next piece, Medtner’s Canzona serenata, was absolutely gorgeous, as if she decided to bare her soul to the whole world. Chen’s next selection, the first sonata by Shostakovich, was just too much for me. As with everything I write here, your mileage may vary, but I just do not enjoy that piece, at all. She rocked it, but I just can’t. I’m sorry! In any event, I don’t quite know what to make of her chances of advancement, but at the very least she established herself as one of the more eclectic performers in the field.

Finally, American Jonathan Mamora, an enormous fellow who could easily stay in the Fort Worth area and walk into Cowboys training camp in a few months without anyone noticing, brought something completely new to the stage by opening with four etudes by contemporary composer David Onac. These etudes were a requirement from another competition he had attended, and he loved them enough to bring them to the Cliburn. Very cool. After some sensitive and contemplative Bach, and a spirited Rachtime, Mamora brought the thunder with Scriabin’s Piano Sonata No. 5. There was a sense of spirituality that permeated each of Mamora’s performances, which makes sense given his background as a church musician. While I’m not sure he has a great chance of advancing deep in the competition, he proved, along with everyone else in the field, his worthiness. 

That’s it for now. One more day of prelims ahead (they’ve actually begun already as I finish typing this), and the next round begins over the weekend.

Thursday, May 22

Preliminary Round, Day One

by Joe Goetz

The first day of the 2025 Van Cliburn International Piano Competition is in the books, and already there have been some transcendent performances. I wasn’t able to watch all of the day’s recitals due to personal commitments, but I saw a good deal of it, so let’s dive into what stood out.

The crux of my job at YourClassical is overseeing the music selections that are heard on the radio and our various on-demand streams, so I’m always fascinated to see how each contestant arranges their recital programs. Obviously programming music for radio/on-demand is a whole other ballgame compared to programming for a competition in front of a worldwide live audience, but that doesn’t take away from my intrigue.

At the Cliburn, there are certain works that seem to be “competition favorites,” which multiple contestants choose. For example, both Ravel’s Gaspard de la Nuit and Liszt’s Réminiscences de Don Juan appeared several times on Day One alone. These selections aren’t surprising, as they’re both powerhouses of virtuosity that are sure to please when executed well. What interests me more, however, are two things: a) which works contestants choose to surround these big powerhouses; and b) recital programs that include the unexpected. On Day One, several contestants did one or both of those things with aplomb.

Preliminary Recital No. 1

It seemed fitting to me that the very first contestant on Wednesday morning began his program with a world premiere. As I mentioned in the introduction to the competition, each preliminary round recital must contain the specially commissioned work, Rachtime, written by Gabriela Montero. Chinese pianist Xuanxiang Lu opted to open his recital, and by extension the entire competition, with this work! I wasn’t able to see it live, but I plan to go back and watch when I have time. I was able to tune in for the second pianist of the morning, Shangru Du, also from China. He immediately warmed my nerdy music programmer’s heart with his first two selections, Tchaikovsky’s Nocturne in C-sharp minor, Op 19 No. 4, followed by the aforementioned Ravel Gaspard de la Nuit. He played these two selections without pause, to great effect, as the quiet C-sharp minor close of the Tchaikovsky dovetailed perfectly with the D-flat major quiet quavers that begin the Ravel. That programming sensitivity scored points with me, for sure, although I’m not the one who needs to be impressed.

Preliminary Recital No. 2

In the second batch of recitals during the afternoon, Ryota Yamazaki of Japan opted for a bold beginning to his competition, starting with Busoni’s transcription of Bach’s Nunn komm, der Heiden Heiland, followed immediately by Mozart’s 18th piano sonata. The Busoni is not one of his more overtly virtuosic Bach transcriptions, of which he wrote several, and Mozart is … well, Mozart. Not easy, but not a virtuoso work by any stretch. In a competition where first impressions are incredibly important, I found these choices to be quite a statement. However, we didn’t have to wait long for the virtuosity to begin, as Yamazaki concluded his opening round with a thrilling and nearly flawless performance of Liszt’s fiendishly difficult Réminiscences de Norma.

The biggest highlight of the afternoon, however, was the Canadian-American pianist Carter Johnson. No stranger to big competitions, having earned a silver medal at the 2024 Gina Bachauer International Piano Competition, I’d bet pretty good money on him making a deep run in the Cliburn as well. He began his preliminary round with Bach’s sublime Capriccio in B-flat Major, BWV 992 "On the Departure of a Beloved Brother,” which livestream host Buddy Bray speculated was the first time it had ever been played at the Cliburn. After a playful rendition of Montero’s Rachtime, Johnson turned to Clementi, whose piano sonatinas are a staple for budding young pianists, and whose more mature piano sonatas are actually very difficult. Johnson’s performance of Clementi’s Sonata in F-sharp Minor, Op. 25, No. 5 carried lots of gravitas, and paved the way for the heavy-metal virtuosity required for a collection of short Prokofiev pieces that had me on the edge of my very uncomfortable couch. 

Preliminary Recital No. 3

The three evening recitals each began in ways that didn’t particularly wow me, but each ended dazzlingly. Aristo Sham of Hong Kong began with the Bach-Busoni Chaconne, always a competition staple. His interpretation, while executed well, seemed a little too aggressive for my taste (again, these are my own personal preferences — your mileage may vary), but his aggressiveness paid dividends in Ravel’s Gaspard de la Nuit.

American pianist Angel Stanislav Wang begin with Beethoven’s quirky G Minor Fantasy, which has never been one of my favorites, but then close with the second Liszt Réminiscences de Don Juan of the day, and boy oh boy, did he milk it for all its worth. I had never heard some of his tempo and dynamic changes before, and they were extremely effective, and at times downright humorous — not to mention his superb technical prowess.

Finally, Russian contestant Philipp Lynov opened with yet another Bach Capriccio in B-flat Major, BWV 992 "On the Departure of a Beloved Brother,” which, while not as strong as Carter Johnson earlier in the day, was followed by Samuel Barber’s monumental Piano Sonata. This work, so difficult that Barber himself was unable to play it, concludes with a movement that is half blues, half toccata, half fugue, and half scherzo. Is that four halves? Indeed it is, because it feels like you need two superhuman pianists to pull it off, and Lynov did just that, eliciting some of the most raucous applause of the day to send everyone home (or in my case, to bed) on a high note. I also award some unofficial bonus programming points to Lynov for bookending his program with Bach and Barber!

If the first day of competition was any indication, the field this year is stronger than ever, and we’re going to be in for a treat for the next few weeks. I look forward to what the next two days of the preliminary round have to offer!

Tuesday, May 20

The Van Cliburn International Piano Competition: The Basics

by Joe Goetz

Before the competition begins, we thought we’d provide this FAQ to help set the stage for what’s to come.

Who was Van Cliburn?

Van Cliburn (1934 – 2013) was an American concert pianist who burst onto the world stage in 1958 by winning the inaugural International Tchaikovsky Competition in Moscow. The judges in the competition reportedly had to ask Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev for his blessing before awarding him the prize. “Is he the best?” Khrushchev asked. When the judges confirmed that he was, Khrushchev responded, “Then give him the prize.”

Cliburn returned home as a Cold War hero to a ticker-tape parade in New York City. To this day, he remains the only American pianist to win the International Tchaikovsky Competition’s top prize.

When did the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition begin?

Following Cliburn’s triumph in Russia, the National Guild of Piano Teachers capitalized on his newfound celebrity to secure funding for a brand-new piano competition named in his honor. The first-ever Van Cliburn International Piano Competition was held in 1962, and it has been held, generally, every four years since. The 2021 competition was delayed one year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, hence this year’s competition coming only three years following the 2022 competition.

Who has won the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition?

Many great pianists have entered the competition, yet did not win a prize. Conversely, there are many Cliburn prizewinners who have, despite their initial burst of fame, not become household names. Some notable medalists include Radu Lupu (gold medal, 1966), Christian Zacharias (silver medal, 1973), Barry Douglas (bronze medal, 1985), Jon Nakamatsu (gold medal, 1997), Olga Kern (gold medal, 2001), and Haochen Zhang (gold medal, 2009).

Previous Van Cliburn medal winners

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More recent winners have found great success, but it’s still too soon to say for sure whether their careers will have the staying power of their predecessors.

What is the format of the competition?

The competition begins with online video submissions, of which this year the committee received 340, representing 45 nations. Of those submissions, 30 were invited to perform in the “main event,” so to speak, which begins this week. That number has since shrunk by one following the late withdrawal of Russian entrant Anatasia Vorotnaya due to health reasons.

The competitors must come prepared for four rounds of recitals and concertos, with each round becoming progressively more complex. The first two rounds are solo recitals, and competitors may choose their own programs. In the first round, however, each competitor MUST include a newly commissioned work written especially for the competition. This year, that work is called “Rachtime,” written by pianist, composer, and jury member Gabriela Montero.

After the first two rounds, the field is whittled down by roughly a third each time, leaving a dozen or so contestants for the semifinals. In the semifinals, each pianist must perform a 60-minute solo recital plus a Mozart piano concerto of their choosing, accompanied by the Fort Worth Symphony.

The final round usually features six remaining pianists, each of whom must perform TWO concertos: one of their choosing (usually a virtuosic warhorse by Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, or Prokofiev), plus another from a list provided by the competition. You can find that list of concertos at the bottom of the Van Cliburn competition’s schedule page.

Who are the favorites to win this year’s competition?

It’s nearly impossible to say! Handicapping a group of 28 pianists who are not widely known is an exercise in futility, but that’s what makes watching the Cliburn so much fun!

In the preliminary rounds, you might encounter a pianist whose playing and/or program choices you find to be extraordinary, but perhaps the judges prefer another. Usually, though, by the semifinal round, favorites begin to emerge. In the 2022 competition, eventual gold medalist Yunchan Lim wowed audiences in Fort Worth and across the world with his stunning performance of Franz Liszt’s complete Transcendental Etudes.

I remember thinking there wasn’t much of a question, at that point, who would go on to win! We’ll see if any pianist rises to the top this year in the early rounds, or if there is lots of parity. Either way, it’s bound to be exciting.

Be sure to check back to this page throughout the competition. I’ll be watching as much as I can, recapping daily programs as much as possible, and offering my opinions on who I think has the best chance of winning. The competition’s media folks will also be sending YourClassical audio of each round, so expect some highlights on the radio as well.

Happy Cliburn Season to all who celebrate!

ST. PAUL, Minn., June 5, 2025 – Today, American Public Media (APM) announces that following a national search, Valerie Kahler has been chosen as the next host of YourClassical’s Performance Today. Last July, APM announced Fred Child’s plans to step down from Performance Today in October 2025, completing a 25-year run as host of America’s most popular classical music radio show.  

Performance Today, winner of the 2014 Gabriel Award for artistic achievement, is broadcast on hundreds of public radio stations nationwide and features live concert recordings, highlights from new album releases, and in-studio performances and interviews. The show is based in St. Paul, Minnesota. 

Valerie Kahler comes to Performance Today as a familiar voice for the audience nationwide, as she currently serves as a host and producer for APM’s Classical 24 and has been a frequent guest host for Performance Today. She is also the longtime producer of APM’s New Classical Tracks and YourClassical Storytime podcasts.   

“I’m thrilled to step into the role of host for Performance Today, a show I’ve admired since my earliest days in radio for its smarts, charm, and talent for sharing classical music at its living, breathing, occasionally mischievous — and always excellent — best,” Kahler says. “I’m deeply honored to follow in the footsteps of broadcast legends and dear friends Fred Child and Martin Goldsmith, whose vision and voices brought the show to life and gave it its heart. I look forward to carrying their legacy with care and curiosity.” 

Kahler began her radio career in 1989 as a volunteer at KNAU (now Arizona Public Radio) in Flagstaff, Arizona, and worked as a classical music host and music director for over a decade before joining APM in 2001. In addition to her radio work, Kahler is an active musician, playing cello with two Minnesota orchestras and her chamber group, the Lochan Quartet. Kahler is also an avid singer and was a founding member of the Prairie Fire Choir (formerly Prairie Fire Lady Choir), where she arranged songs by artists such as Bonnie "Prince" Billy, The Magnetic Fields and Leonard Cohen for a cappella treble voices. 

“I’m thrilled for Performance Today, for our stations and listeners, that my talented friend Valerie Kahler will succeed me as host,” Child says. “Valerie is not just an accomplished radio host, a marvelous cellist, and a beautiful singer. She’s one of my all-time favorite storytellers. Her passion for music and her joy in connecting with audiences come through every time she’s present, in person or on radio. I wholeheartedly welcome Valerie Kahler as the next host of Performance Today.” 

Kahler will take over the mic as full-time host beginning in November 2025.  

About YourClassical  
YourClassical® is a collection of curated classical music listening experiences and information produced by Minnesota Public Radio and American Public Media Group. YourClassical provides audiences with the music they love through terrestrial broadcasts and multiple web-based platforms. Nationally syndicated YourClassical programs include Pipedreams®, SymphonyCast®, Composers Datebook® and Performance Today®, and are in addition to the Radio, Lullaby, Relax, Peaceful Piano, and Holiday audio streams that can be found at yourclassical.org. Regional music programming produced by YourClassical MPR®, is a trusted companion for listeners across Minnesota on broadcast radio, web interfaces and live events. YourClassical MPR’s Kid’s Initiatives strives to inspire the next generation of music fans and artists through in-school learning experiences, educational content, and resources for teachers and parents. Each week, over 2.3 million people listen to YourClassical. Learn more and listen at yourclassical.org.   

For half a century, students have come to Red Wing to learn the art and craft of instrumental building and repair at Minnesota State College Southeast. On May 15 and 16, the college is celebrating those “50 Years of Lutherie” with a showcase of its guitar and violin programs.

The programs, which have helped hundreds of students from all 50 states and many countries across the world carve out careers in instrument building and repair, had their genesis in 1974 when the college was still known as the Red Wing Area Vocational-Technical Institute. The institute’s director, Ed Dunn, saw a need for a program that wasn’t offered anywhere else nearby.

The first iteration, combining violin and guitar repair, was so successful that the college added band instrument repair in 1976. Guitar and violin were separated into two programs in 1990, and in 2010, the guitar track added a second-year program emphasizing development and production.

Steve Rossow, who earned degrees in both the violin repair and guitar repair/building programs, is now lead instructor in Violin Repair and Making. He arrived at the college after an early musical education of “trying to get my hands on just about every instrument” — including saxophone, piano and drums — before settling on string instruments, specifically the finger-style acoustic guitar.

To indulge another passion, woodworking, he started making furniture, which “was fun while it lasted,” but he was really interested in learning how to make a guitar.

“I always knew this [Minnesota State College Southeast] program was here, so in 2000, I moved down here and learned the proper way,” Rossow explains. “I came specifically for the guitar program. After graduation I wondered, ‘What is this violin thing?’ A lot of people crossed over.” So he stayed on to learn violin making and repair.

“I got totally hooked on the repair and restoration side of the violin,” he says. “It’s a little different than the guitar, it has a mystique that I really liked. Violins can be taken completely apart and put back together, which is fascinating to me.”

After earning his degrees, Rossow landed a job with legendary St. Paul luthier John Waddle, who “threw me right into the deep end of restoration jobs,” he recalls. “These were not cheap instruments — apparently he trusted me to work right away on pretty deep, intricate things.”

In 2010, Rossow was asked to help start the second-year guitar program at Minnesota State College Southeast. He designed a curriculum incorporating a machine, run by a computer program, that carves blank pieces of wood into the parts needed to build a working instrument. The curriculum includes advanced guitar construction, including arched-top guitars and mandolins.

Eventually transitioning to become head of the violin program, Rossow returned to that mystique that fascinated him. It’s a fertile ground for instruction, with challenges for students that both stand alone and overlap with other disciplines.

“For somebody new starting out, the violin bridge, for example, can tell a lot about the skills a student maker possesses,” he says. “Being able to see a surface, see curves, see smoothness or lack of smoothness is the first part of the challenge.

“A big part of the quality of work is, can you see what you need to do, and can you do it?” Rossow says. “The amount of feedback I give students is pretty deep. I don’t let them get away with things being sloppy. It’s a fine line between sloppy work and good work. When I finally see them get there, it’s kind of a delight — I’m doing my job.”

Student Kiran Hafner from South Carolina has “gotten there” — she has completed her first violin (which will be played at the violin showcase) and is working on a viola, an instrument she’s played since middle school.

“It has been incredible to go through the entire process of building a violin in such a short amount of time,” she says. “It’s a lot to take in, but I have loved each and every challenge that it brings. It is so fulfilling to put months of work in and watch as it starts to look more and more like a violin with each step.”

Andrew Sheldon, a student from Saskatchewan who has built an acoustic guitar and electric guitar that both will be displayed at the showcase, appreciates the in-depth nature of the instruction.

“The length of the program was the biggest influence on my decision to come to the school,” he says. “I wanted to spend as much time as I could surrounded by this type of work. I’m glad I didn’t settle for a quick crash course on guitar repair because there’s so much to learn that can’t be taught in just a few weeks.”

Rossow said he believes Minnesota State College Southeast is the only higher-learning institution that offers a diploma for guitar work. He added, “I think what sets us aside from other schools and programs shorter than ours is there is a lot of repetition, doing one job over and over and over,” he said. “It sounds boring, but that’s what it takes for quality work, rather than taking a two-week course.”

He emphasized that “We do lots of one on one — it’s very thorough, the way the programs are set up. There’s nothing near what we’re doing here.”

The program’s breadth allows time for students and instructors to bond over their creations, and frustrations. “We are all so excited about our builds, and we’ve been helping each other out the entire year,” Sheldon says. “Building a guitar is very stressful — so much can go wrong at any time. Having people around to bounce ideas off of and answer questions has made everything less stressful and more enjoyable.”

Hafner, who spent a year at Florida State studying music therapy, came to Red Wing after deciding to change course and explore a different path to a music career. “I remembered learning about luthiers at some point during my musical journey, and the idea had always intrigued me,” she said. After researching other programs around the country, Minnesota State College Southeast stood out, partly because of its affordability, but also for the intensive nature of instruction. “I decided to go for it, and I am so glad that I chose to come here,” she said.

Hafner acknowledged that many students come to Minnesota State College Southeast to learn the art of repair, but she put in a plug for the instrument-making classes as well. “I would highly recommend it,” she said. “Knowing what goes into building instruments comes in handy when repairing them.”

The specialized nature of the programs has an added benefit, she said. “Because violin-making is such a niche skill, the program draws students from around the country. Everyone has such a different background in life, education and music, and it has honestly been life-changing to get to know them.”

After their time at Minnesota State College Southeast, Sheldon and Hafner both feel well-prepared for their musical futures.

“I get to leave the program with two guitars that I designed and built exactly the way I wanted,” Sheldon says. “It doesn’t get much better than that!”

Hafner is looking forward to her new job starting later this month at an instrument repair shop in South Carolina.

“I feel like I have found something I can spend the rest of my life doing,” she says.

The 50 Years of Lutherie activities on Thursday and Friday include campus and lab tours every half hour, an open acoustic jam session and a concert by professional guitarists Mike Cramer, Phil Heywood and Chris Silver. Student-made guitars and violins also will be on display; program alumni are invited to bring an instrument they have made for inclusion in the showcase by contacting Tim Reede (treede@southeastmn.edu).

Event info

What: 50 Years of Lutherie
When: Open House, 11 am.-1 p.m. May 15; Student Guitar Show, 1-4 p.m. May 15; Student Violin Showcase, 10 a.m.-12 p.m. May 16; informal reception following
More information: Free, but RSVP requested

Friendship. Love. Anguish. This opera’s story begins and ends in a garret in Paris, as a group of friends and lovers find love and joy amid the hardship and struggle of a life in pursuit of art. It's Giacomo Puccini's La Bohème, with libretto by Giuseppe Giacosa and Luigi Illica, and it was performed by the Minnesota Opera last season at the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts. Listen now!

The Story

On a bitterly cold winter’s night in the heart of Paris, a young woman’s search for a candle light fatefully sparks one of the most enduring love stories of all time. But can a love so great be sustained? Join Mimì, Rodolfo, and their bohemian friends as they find levity and joy amidst the hardship and struggle of a life in pursuit of art. Featuring some of the most captivating music ever written, Puccini’s La Bohème weaves moments of warmth and ecstasy together with anguish and heartbreak in this enduring story of love, loss, and life. 

ACT I
In their garret in Paris’ Latin Quarter, near-destitute artist Marcello and poet Rodolfo try to keep warm by feeding the stove with pages from Rodolfo’s latest drama. They are soon joined by their roommates — Colline, a philosopher, and Schaunard, a musician, who brings food, fuel, and funds he has collected from an eccentric nobleman. While they celebrate their unexpected fortune, the landlord, Benoit, comes to collect the rent. After getting Benoit drunk, the friends urge him to tell of his flirtations, then throw him out in mock indignation at his infidelity to his wife. As the others depart to revel at the Café Momus, Rodolfo remains behind to finish an article, promising to join them later. There is a power cut. Mimì, a neighbor, knocks on the door and asks for a light. As she enters the room, she suddenly feels faint. Rodolfo gives her a sip of wine, then helps her to the door. Mimì realizes that she dropped her key when she fainted, and the two search for it. Rodolfo finds the key and slips it into his pocket. In the moonlight, the two get to know each other. Rodolfo tells Mimì about his dreams, and she talks to him about her lonely life. Rodolfo’s friends call from outside, urging him to join them. He responds that he is not alone and will be along shortly. Happy to have found each other, Mimì and Rodolfo leave together for the café.
 
ACT II
Amid the shouts of street hawkers near the Café Momus, Rodolfo introduces Mimì to his friends. They all sit down and order supper. The toy vendor Parpignol passes by, besieged by children. Marcello’s former sweetheart, Musetta, makes a noisy entrance on the arm of the elderly, but wealthy, Alcindoro. The ensuing tumult reaches its peak when, trying to gain Marcello’s attention, Musetta loudly sings the praises of her own popularity. Sending Alcindoro away to buy her a new pair of shoes, Musetta finally falls into Marcello’s arms. A “gilets jaunes,” or yellow vests, protest walks by the café, and as the bohemians fall in behind, the returning Alcindoro is presented with the check.

 
ACT III
At dawn, in a cabaret in the fringes of the city, Musetta, as the mistress of ceremony, and guests are heard drinking and singing. Mimì arrives, searching for Rodolfo. Marcello comes out of the bar, and she tells him of her distress over Rodolfo’s incessant jealousy. She can’t handle him anymore and believes they should part. As Rodolfo emerges from the bar, Mimì hides nearby. Rodolfo tells Marcello that he wants to separate from Mimì, blaming her flirtatiousness. Pressed for the real reason, he breaks down, saying that her illness can only grow worse in the poverty they share. Overcome with emotion, Mimì comes forward to say goodbye to her lover. Marcello runs back into the cabaret upon hearing Musetta’s laughter. While Mimì and Rodolfo recall past happiness, Marcello returns with Musetta, quarreling about her flirting with a customer. They hurl insults at each other and part, but Mimì and Rodolfo decide to remain together until springtime.
 
ACT IV
Months later, Rodolfo and Marcello are now moving out from the garret. They have both separated from their girlfriends and they reflect on their loneliness. Colline and Schaunard bring a meager meal. To lighten their spirits, the four stage a dance, which turns into a mock duel. At the height of the hilarity, Musetta bursts in with news that Mimì is outside, looking very weak. As Rodolfo runs to her aid, Musetta relates how Mimì begged to be taken to Rodolfo to die. She is made as comfortable as possible. While the friends decide to collect money to buy her medicine, Colline goes off to pawn his overcoat. Left alone, Mimì and Rodolfo recall their first meeting and the early happy days of their relationship. The others return and as Musetta prays, Mimì slowly drifts into unconsciousness. The friends realize that she is dead, and Rodolfo collapses in despair.

Pre-Concert Interview

Soprano Melinda Whittington, who sings the role of Mimì in her Minnesota Opera and role debut, and baritone Joo Wan Kang, who sings Marcello, joined host Bonnie North in MPR’s Maud Moon Weyerhaeuser studio to talk about why La Bohème is so popular more than 100 years after its premiere. Listen to their conversation about this exciting production now!

Find out more on the MN Opera’s official site and watch the trailer for the production below.

Pope Francis, the first non-European head of the Roman Catholic Church in more than a millennium, died Monday at age 88. Francis was one of the most popular popes in decades and a towering figure on the world stage, addressing not just Catholics but the men and women of our time.

As one might expect from such an engaged figure, Pope Francis was well known as a fan of music, cinema and soccer. As a music fan, Francis even had a favorite record store in Rome — StereoSound, on Via della Minerva, near the Pantheon — which he began visiting when he first started making visits to Rome as Jorge Bergoglio, archbishop of Buenos Aires.

Naturally, Bergoglio’s visits to StereoSound decreased when he became Pope Francis, but he made headlines in January 2022 when he visited the store to give a blessing to the owners after they had completed a renovation of the retail space. Just before he left, the owners presented Pope Francis with an album of classical music as a gift.

“The Holy Father is passionate about music,” StereoSound’s owner, Letizia Giostra, confirmed to Italian newspaper Corriere Della Sera following the visit.

Classical music was among the genres Francis most appreciated. In 2013, the newly named Pope Francis talked about his favorite classical composers; specifically, Mozart, Beethoven, Bach, and Wagner. In an interview with America magazine, Francis said, “Among musicians I love Mozart, of course. The ‘Et incarnatus est’ from his Mass in C minor is matchless; it lifts you to God! I love Mozart performed by [Romanian pianist] Clara Haskil. Mozart fulfills me. But I cannot think about his music; I have to listen to it.

“I like listening to Beethoven,” Francis continued, “but in a Promethean way, and the most Promethean interpreter for me is [Wilhelm] Furtwängler.

“And then Bach’s Passions,” Francis said. “The piece by Bach that I love so much is the ‘Erbarme Dich,’ the tears of Peter in the ‘St. Matthew Passion.’ Sublime. Then, at a different level, not intimate in the same way, I love Wagner. I like to listen to him, but not all the time. The performance of Wagner’s ‘Ring’ by Furtwängler at La Scala in Milan in 1950 is for me the best. But also the ‘Parsifal’ by [conductor Hans] Knappertsbusch in 1962.”

The Pope's interest in Wagner is striking given the composer's idiosyncratic views on religion. Wagner wrote that Parsifal was conceived on Good Friday 1857, but it also was inspired by Eastern spirituality, including Buddhism. 

According to Udiscover Music, the pope was quite the music collector. Francis’ music library, which was curated by the president of the Pontifical Council for Culture, Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi, included nearly 2,000 CDs and 19 vinyl records. While most of the library consisted of classical music, it also included recordings by French singer Édith Piaf, music by Argentine tango musician Astor Piazzola, and even some of Elvis Presley’s Gospel songs.

The cardinal said the pope told him his love of music came from boyhood, listening to an opera program on the radio with his mother. “He sent me the complete collection of recordings at the Teatro Colón [opera house] of Buenos Aires,” he said. He added that the pope often sent music accompanied by handwritten notes with “extraordinary, expert” comments. “You can see that he listens to the music carefully,” Ravasi said.

To honor Pope Francis, you might play any of his favorite pieces referenced above, or listen to the official Pope’s Anthem, written by French composer Charles Gounod for the coronation of Pope Pius IX in 1869. Read more about it in this post written for Classical MPR during Pope Francis’ state visit to the United States in 2015.

Join Steve Seel for an Easter celebration with the complete performance of George Frideric Handel's sacred oratorio Messiah, with the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra. Led by conductor Patrick Dupré Quigley, an all-star roster of vocal soloists and the renowned vocal ensemble the Singers, led by Matthew Culloton, the concert was recorded live in December at the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts. Listen now!

Credits

Patrick Dupré Quigley, conductor

Lauren Snouffer, soprano

Clara Osowski, mezzo-soprano

John Matthew Myers, tenor

John Moore, baritone

The Singers — Minnesota Choral Artists, chorus

Matthew Culloton, artistic director

Find out more about the performance through the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra’s digital program book.

On Monday, May 12, a new but familiar voice becomes YourClassical MPR’s host during afternoon drive time. Tom Crann, currently the regional host of All Things Considered on MPR News, will step into the 3 p.m. to 7 p.m. hosting role on YourClassical MPR. “To play classical music, for this supportive audience, in this community of Minnesota listeners is a dream job,” Crann says.

What’s more, Crann’s new role represents a homecoming of sorts. “My career comes full circle with this move,” he says. “My very first air shift on the radio at my college station was playing Mozart, Brahms and so much other music that has been so much a part of my life. I can’t wait to get back to it.”

Meanwhile, Steve Staruch, whose company you’ve enjoyed on YourClassical MPR for 20-plus years, is moving to a new time slot. Starting May 19, Staruch will host Mondays from 6 a.m. to 10 a.m. “I want to thank listeners for allowing me to be part of their kitchens, cars, and cubicles each afternoon,” Staruch says. “I look forward to helping you start off your work week on Monday mornings.”

Staruch will also be filling in at various times during the week as needed. He’ll be putting more energy into the production side of radio, working on interviews and other programming.

And from Tuesday to Friday, longtime morning host John Birge will continue to be a familiar voice and companion to round out your weekday mornings on YourClassical MPR.

Tom Crann’s last day as host of All Things Considered will be May 9. MPR News will work to identify substitute hosts to step in when Tom signs off.

The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra’s 67th concert season, announced this week, will feature collaborations with new and returning artists, and allows SPCO’s own musicians to help shape the ensemble’s artistic vision.

“In our musician-led artistic model, the musicians function as the music director and are involved in every aspect of the programming and what happens on stage,” SPCO Managing Director and President Jon Limbacher said in a news release.

The season, which begins Sept. 12, reflects this sentiment from composer Robert Schumann, whose music is of particular focus of the season: “To send light into the depths of the human heart — this is the artist’s calling!”

The music of Robert and Clara Schumann will be featured throughout the season, as well as Johann Sebastian Bach’s four orchestral suites. These classical touchstones will be performed alongside newer works by composers who were inspired by these musicians.

Featured guest artists this season include pianist Jonathan Biss; violinist Alia Ibragimova; cellist Kiegan Ryan; conductor Mei-Ann Chen; former artistic partner Thomas Zehetmair, and vocalists Mark Billy, Federico De Michelis and Roderick Williams.

This year’s Sandbox series composer in residence is Gabriela Lena Frank, whose premiere composition will be performed in January.  

SPCO commissions having their world premieres are Kiegan Ryan’s Cherokee Song Cycle: Kanohelvsgi Tsunilosvhi and Native Flute Concerto, and new work by Charles Shadle, both in February.

Following the SPCO’s typical performance model, concerts will be held at the Ordway Center for the Performing Arts in downtown St. Paul, as well as at various venues throughout the Twin Cities and surrounding suburbs. Subscription ticket packages ($16-$70 per concert for adults, free for children and students) are now available; more information is available through the SPCO ticket office at 651-291-1144 or on the SPCO website. Individual tickets will go on sale in August. A brochure can be requested via email at tickets@spcomail.org.

The 2025-26 season

• Sept. 12-14, Ordway Concert Hall, St. Paul
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Jupiter Symphony, conducted by Thomas Zehetmair
  Johannes Brahms, Double Concerto for Violin and Cello
  Thomas Zehetmair, Passacaglia, Burlesque and Chorale

• Sept. 19, Wooddale Church, Eden Prairie (11 a.m. and 7 p.m.); Sept. 20, Saint Paul’s United Church of Christ, St. Paul; Sept. 21, Saint Andrew’s Lutheran Church, Mahtomedi
  Johann Sebastian Bach, Partita No. 2 in C Minor
  Germaine Tailleferre, Choral et Deux Variations
  Jean Françaix, Divertissement for Bassoon and String Quartet
  Bach, Orchestral Suite No. 1
  François Couperin, Le Tic-Toc-Choc ou Les Maillotins

• Sept. 26-27, Ordway Concert Hall; Sept. 28, Ted Mann Concert Hall, Minneapolis
  Gabriella Smith, Carrot Revolution
  Shawn Okpebholo, Zoom!
  Abel Selaocoe, Hymns of Bantu (“Ngalala Phantsi,” “Emmanuele,” “Ibuyile iAfrkam,” “Ndikhokhele Bawo”)

• Oct, 17 (11 a.m. and 7 p.m.), Oct. 18, Ordway Concert Hall
  Benjamin Britten, Phantasy, Quartet for Oboe, Violin, Viola and Cello
  Leoš Janáček, Concertino for Piano, Two Violins, Viola, clarinet, Horn and Bassoon
  Janáček, Idyll for Strings
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Piano Concerto No. 14, with conductor/pianist Richard Goode 

• Oct. 23, Shepherd of the Valley Lutheran Church, Apple Valley; Oct. 24, Capri Theater, Minneapolis
  Antonín Dvořák:, Terzetto
  Jlin Patton, Little Black Book
  Dorthy Rudd Moore, Transcension
  Wynton Marsalis, Meeelaan

• Oct. 31-Nov. 2, Ordway Concert Hall
  Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, Sinfonia No. 1
  John Adams, The Wound-Dresser for Baritone and Orchestra (Roderick Williams, baritone)
  George Butterworth, Six Songs from A Shropshire Lad
  Joseph Haydn, Symphony No. 93

  

• Nov. 7-8, Ordway Concert Hall; Nov. 9, Ted Mann Concert Hall
  Jean Françaix, Seven Dances after the ballet “Les malheurs de Sophie”
  Camille Saint-Saëns: Violin Concerto No. 3 (Eunice Kim, violin)
  Ludwig van Beethoven, Symphony No. 1

• Nov. 21, Wooddale Church, Eden Prairie (11 a.m. .and 7 p.m.); Nov. 22, Ordway Concert Hall
  Henry Purcell, Ceremonial Music
  William Byrd, Sellinger’s Round
  Michael Tippett, Divertimento on Sellinger’s Round
  Johann Sebastian Bach, Canon and Fugue from “Art of the Fugue”
  Bach, Orchestra Suite No. 3

• Nov. 28-30, Ordway Concert Hall
  Aaron Copland, Three Latin-American Sketches
  Mary Lou Williams, Zodiac Suite
  Sergei Prokofiev, Violin Concerto No. 2 (Kyu-Young Kim, violin)

• Dec. 12-14, Ordway Concert Hall
  Johann Sebastian Bach, Brandenburg Concertos No. 1, 3, 4, 5, 6

• Dec. 18-19, Basilica of Saint Mary, Minneapolis; Dec. 20-21, Ordway Concert Hall
  George Frideric Handel, Messiah (with Dinis Sousa, conductor; Liv Redpath, soprano; Aryeh Nussbaum Cohen, countertenor; Hugo Hymas, tenor; John Chest, baritone; the Singers, conducted by Matthew Culloton)

• Jan. 16 (11 a.m. and 7 p.m.), Jan. 17, Ordway Concert Hall
  Alfred Schnittke, Moz-Art à la Haydn for Two Violins and Strings
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Violin Concerto No. 3 (Alina Ibragimova, violin)
  Jean Françaix, Quartet for Winds
  Joseph Haydn, Symphony No. 45

• Jan. 30-Feb. 1, Ordway Concert Hall
  Arthur Honegger, Pastorale d'éte for Chamber Orchestra
  Gabriela Lena Frank, Sandbox premiere
  Robert Schumann, Prophet Bird
  With Mei-Ann Chen, conductor; Federico de Michelis, baritone

  

• Feb. 6 (11 a.m. and 7 p.m.), Wooddale Church, Eden Prairie; Feb. 7, Saint Paul’s United Church of Christ, St. Paul; Feb. 8, Saint Andrew’s Lutheran Church, Mahtomedi
  Domenico Scarlatti, Sinfonia No. 7
  Francesco Geminiani, Sonata, Opus 4, No. 9
  Johann Sebastian Bach, Orchestral Suite No. 2
  Arcangelo Corelli, Concerto Grosso, Opus 6, No. 10
  With Alicia McQuerrey, flute, and Steven Copes, violin

• Feb. 12, Shepherd of the Valley Lutheran Church, Apple Valley; Feb. 13, Capri Theater, Minneapolis
  Claude Debussy, Sonata en trio for Flute, Viola and Harp
  Kiegan Ryan, Cherokee Song Cycle: Kanohelvsgi Tsunilosvhi
  Ryan, Native Flute Concerto
  Charles Shadle, new work
  With Mark Billy, baritone and Native American flute, and Kiegan Ryan, cello

  

• Feb. 20-21, Ordway Concert Hall, Feb. 22, Ted Mann Concert Hall
  George Frideric Handel, Selections from Water Music
  Johann Sebastian Bach, Orchestral Suite No. 4
  Ludwig van Beethoven, Symphony No. 4

• March 13 (11 a.m. and 7 p.m.), Wooddale Church, Eden Prairie; March 14, Saint Paul’s United Church of Christ, St. Paul, March 15, Saint Andrew’s Lutheran Church, Mahtomedi
  Grace Williams, Sea Sketches
  Ralph Vaughan Williams, The Lark Ascending (Nina Tso-Ning Fan, violin)
  William Walton, Henry V: Two Pieces for Strings
  Joseph Haydn, Symphony No. 80

• March 27-28, Ordway Concert Hall; March 29, Ted Mann Concert Hall
  Sally Beamish, Viola Concerto No. 1 (Tabea Zimmermann, viola)
  Franz Schubert, Symphony No. 2

• April 10 (11 .am. and 7 p.m.), Ordway Concert Hall; April 11, Saint Paul’s United Church of Christ, St. Paul
  Edvard Grieg, Lyric Pieces
  Quinn Mason, Princesa de la Luna for Harp and String Orchestra
  Claude Debussy, Children’s Corner for Woodwind Quintet
  Richard Strauss, Duet-Concertino for Clarinet and Bassoon with String Orchestra (Sang Yoon Kim, clarinet; Andrew Brady, bassoon)

• April 24-26, Ordway Concert Hall
  Claude Debussy, Syrinx for Solo Flute (Julia Bogorad-Kogan, flute)
  Sofia Gubaidulina, Reflections on the Theme B-A-C-H
  Sergei Prokofiev, Visions fugitives (Mimoletnosti)
  Mauricio Kagel, Pan for Piccolo and String Quartet (Alicia McQuerrey, piccolo)
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Serenade No. 12: Nachtmusik

• April 30, Shepherd of the Valley Lutheran Church, Apple Valley; May 1-2, Ordway Concert Hall; May 3, Saint Andrew’s Lutheran Church, Mahtomedi
  Joseph Haydn, Symphony No. 67
  Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Clarinet Concerto (Sang Yoon Kim, clarinet)

• May 8, Capri Theater, Minneapolis
  Amy Beach, String Quartet (In One Movement)
  Arthur Foote, A Night Piece
  Shawn Okpebholo, Lullaby | Ballad | Spiritual
  Charles Ives, String Quartet No. 1, “From the Salvation Army”

• May 15-17, Ordway Concert Hall
  Osvaldo Golijov, Lullaby and Doina for Winds and Strings
  Ernest Bloch, Nigun for Violin
  Maurice Ravel, Kaddish from Two Hebrew Songs
  Martin Fröst, Klezmer Dance No. 2
  Dmitri Shostakovich, String Quartet No. 9

• May 22 (11 a.m. and 7 p.m.), May 23, Ordway Concert Hall; May 24, Ted Mann Concert Hall
  Pérotin, Viderunt Omnes
  Caroline Shaw, Punctum
  François Couperin, Pieces en Concert
  John Cage, Dream
  Julius Eastman, The Holy Presence of Joan d’Arc (Abel Selaocoe, cello)

• June 4, Shepherd of the Valley Lutheran Church, Apple Valley; June 5-6, Ordway Concert Hall
  Augusta Read Thomas, Clara’s Ascent
  Clara Schumann, Trio in G Minor for Violin, Cello and Piano (Jonathan Biss, piano)
  Robert Schumann, Introduction and Allegro appassionato (Konzertstuck)
  György Kurtág:, Hommage a Robert Schumann for Clarinet, Viola and Piano
  Kurtág, Selections from Jatekok (Games)
  Robert Schumann, Piano Concerto

  

• Jun 12-14, Ordway Concert Hall
  Zoltán Kodály, Summer Evening
  Richard Strauss, Metamorphosen
  Robert Schumann, Symphony No. 3, Rhenish
  With Gábor Takács-Nagy, conductor

When it comes to impressive artist biographies, Leif Ove Andsnes just about has it all. Born in Karmøy, Norway, the Scandinavian pianist boasts an extensive career featuring a discography of over 50 titles, many of which have been nominated for Grammys and Gramophone Awards, as well as collaborations with major orchestras, including the Berlin Philharmonic, New York Philharmonic, Los Angeles Philharmonic, San Francisco Symphony and London Philharmonic. He has also won prizes at various international piano competitions and was the youngest musician to curate Carnegie Hall’s Perspectives series in 2004. The list goes on, truly, and I encourage you to explore more of his well-earned achievements on his website when you have the time.

But in the end, when you decide to attend a performance by an internationally acclaimed musician, what you’re really looking for isn’t the frankly impressive biography printed in a rather small font in the middle of a booklet (program notes are always appreciated during intermission or when you realize you’ve accidentally taken it home instead of returning it to the kind chaperones who showed you to your seat); instead, what you’re hoping is to witness music-making that can truly reach you at your core, and make you feel something. And on Friday, March 28, at the Ordway Center for Performing Arts, Andsnes did just that.

Andsnes’ performance was a part of the Schubert Club’s International Artists Series and featured music by two fellow Norwegians, Edvard Grieg and Geirr Tveitt, and the beloved Polish composer Frédéric Chopin. The program was top-heavy, with the first half delivering more than 50 minutes of music, followed by a shorter 37-minute second half. It’s not quite as common to hear solo performances with this format, but I found it to be a welcome change, particularly for an evening concert on a cold March day.

The concert was preceded by a short speech by Barry Kempton, the artistic and executive director of the Schubert Club, during which he disclosed that Andsnes had assisted the Schubert Club in selecting its new Hamburg Steinway, which he would be performing on that very night. It was a pleasant surprise to know that the piano would be of liking to Andsnes, as there’s nothing quite as off-putting as performing on an instrument you don’t enjoy playing on. Then, Kempton bowed out, and Andsnes walked on stage.

Edvard Grieg: Piano Sonata in E Minor, Op. 7

Grieg was a Norwegian composer known for blending Germanic Romantic style with traditional Norwegian folk elements. Although his music is programmed far and wide, his Piano Sonata isn’t quite as often performed. He composed it when he was 22 and recently engaged, and the piece certainly reflects that youthful joy. Andsnes’ performance of the piece was as lovely as it was captivating.

He’s an elegant pianist, and his approach to the keyboard is founded in excellent voicing combined with a lovely, round sound that can be heard clearly from the first row of the hall to the gallery on the last floor. His phrasing was sensible and long, something that helped guide the audience through the piece.

One audience member I spoke to afterward praised Andsnes’ ability to perform in an “orchestral manner,” bringing out diverse quality of sound and character in the different sections while holding the piece together as one. It was these traits that really made for a memorable performance.

Listen below to Andsnes’ 1993 recording of the first movement of the Grieg’s sonata.

Geirr Tveitt: Piano Sonata No. 29 (Sonata Etere), Op. 129

The second piece on the program was Tveitt’s Sonata Etere. Tveitt, a lesser-known composer, was born in 1908, one year after Grieg’s death. According to the program notes provided by Michael Adams, he was a Norwegian composer and pianist who was a central figure of the national movement in Norwegian cultural life during the 1930s. Andsnes also took some time before the piece to speak about Tveitt’s music and life, mentioning how Tviett’s music was influenced by both French and Russian piano music, how it was experimental and oftentimes epic. At the center of the piece are folk melodies, Andsnes explained, and then proceeded to play the main theme of the sonata that would repeat itself throughout in various forms and iterations. Andsnes also conveyed that this was Tveitt’s only surviving sonata, and that the rest of them had perished in a fire.

Andsnes performed this piece with a score, which is common practice with newer music. I’ll admit that coming into an evening concert with a 33-minute piece by a 20th-century composer I had never heard of was daunting. If handled incorrectly, a performer can alienate or bore the audience with unfamiliar music. But Andsnes did the complete opposite. Not only did his performance convince me of the beauty and intricacy of Tveitt’s music, but it also convinced me of his own performance ability.

Andsnes is a captivating performer. He knows how to keep you engaged, how to lead you from one phrase to another and create a quality of sound that keeps you listening until it has decayed into complete silence. The piece also featured the use of harmonics, in which Andnes would hold down the notes of the lower half of the piano and play on the upper half, creating a magical network of sounds that seem to exist just beyond our ears’ threshold.

This performance was so impactful that Andsnes received a standing ovation afterward. In the many years I’ve attended performances, I have witnessed few who have inspired such awe as to warrant a standing ovation after the first half, and I do believe, in this case, it was well-deserved.

Listen below to Tveitt’s performance of his own Sonata Etere.

Frédéric Chopin: 24 Preludes, Op. 28

The final piece on the program was the most famous and popular of the three. Chopin’s 24 Preludes have enjoyed performances and recordings by just about every pianist in the industry. And it’s understandable, as the piece is filled with what kids these days may refer to as “certified bangers.” They’re catchy, short, incredibly diverse in their content, and overall, a joy to listen to.

Andsnes’ approach to this set of pieces is certainly a more Germanic one. This was perhaps not felt as much in the faster-paced preludes, which he performed with nimble fingers, beautiful voicing and bright colors. But it was rather present in the slower preludes. Yet, as someone who personally prefers a more romantic approach to these pieces, which includes taking a bit more time in certain spots and infusing the sound with a bit more despair or joy, when appropriate, I still found myself enjoying the performance thoroughly. Andsnes is very convincing in his approach, so much so that, even if you don’t quite agree with his interpretative decisions, you’re able to understand where he’s coming from and, for a moment, enjoy music through his artistic lens. And I think that’s a great example of beautiful artistry.

Listen below to Andsnes’ 1992 recording of one of Chopin’s etudes, another short piece by the Polish composer.

Encore — Claude Debussy: La Cathédrale Engloutie

The concert ended with another standing ovation and two curtain calls. On the third, Andsnes sat down, and nothing quiets an audience more than knowing they’re about to get an encore by a pianist they’d been thoroughly enjoying for the last hour and a half. What followed was a dreamy performance of one of Debussy’s own 24 preludes, La Cathédrale Engloutie (The Sunken Cathedral). It was the perfect dessert after such a great meal, and featured Andsnes’ expert use of the pedal and his wonderfully round sound, which filled the space and created an amazing sense of being suspended in air, a sensation that Debussy’s music can often create.

Listen below to Debussy’s performance of his own prelude.

Andsnes’ performance was captivating and memorable, with his approach to the keyboard engaging the audience in every measure. If you’re already somebody who enjoys going out to listen to big, solo concerts, I’m sure there’s no need for me to persuade you to listen to Andsnes. But if you haven’t taken that step yet, I encourage you to give Andsnes a chance. Start with something short, such as a few preludes, perhaps. Find something that touches that spot deep in your core that only music can reach, and then slowly find your way to even more great music like Grieg and Tveitt. I assure you: You won’t be disappointed.

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The music will be personal for the Chamber Music Society of Minnesota when it honors one of its own, founding pianist Paul Schoenfield, with a tribute concert on April 6.

The concert, an homage to the composer/performer/teacher who died last year at 77, is profoundly meaningful for the society’s co-founder and artistic director, violinist Young-Nam Kim. He and Schoenfield met in Ohio in 1970, a fortuitous pairing that not only resulted in the genesis of the chamber music society but a close performing relationship that included several concerts at Carnegie Hall.

Kim planned the tribute with Schoenfield’s composing strengths in mind. “After many agonizing hours to come up with a meaningful program for Paul, I landed with ‘Paul & Nigun,’” he says. (“Nigun,” Hebrew for “melody,” refer to traditional Jewish songs.) “Throughout the many years of our collaboration and friendship, I learned that Paul’s most intense creativity dwells in the slow movements, and they are all in the spirit of ‘Nigun.’”

To that end, the concert includes six of Schoenfield’s own “Nigun” compositions, billed as “the central point of all his output,” and their surrounding movements, including “Three Country Fiddle Pieces.”

Opening the program will be a video clip of Schoenfield, in 1966, playing Modest Mussorgsky’s Promenade as part of one of Leonard Bernstein’s Young People’s Concerts. He went on to make his debut at New York’s Town Hall as a teenager and study with such piano luminaries as Rudolf Serkin.

But it wasn’t all a life of grand concert halls; Schoenfield also entertained patrons as the house pianist at Murray’s steak house in Minneapolis, a stint that inspired his 1986 piano trio Café Music, commissioned by the St. Paul Chamber Orchestra.

“Paul was a true master composer of the tradition in that his affection and total understanding of his beloved old masters as well as the folk music of many genres were so complete,” Kim says. “I could consult him on any standard work, and he would know it inside out. Thus, snippets of the old masters or folk tunes will inadvertently sneak up discreetly in his music.” As an example, “Three Country Fiddle Pieces,” written in 1979, was one of Schoenfield’s first pieces to infuse folk music, electric violin and a drum set.  

The last segment of the concert begins with Antonin Dvořák’s “Dumka,” which Kim says is featured “because I can still hear Paul’s beautiful playing that mesmerized me when we first sat down to rehearse it” during their youthful days in Ohio. Concluding the program is “Adagio” from the piano quintet that Schoenfield wrote as his doctoral thesis at the University of Arizona in 1970.

Featured performers in the concert include Kim and his daughter, fellow violinist Ariana Kim; violist Sally Chisholm; cellist Anthony Ross; clarinetist Sang Yoon Kim, and pianist Mary Jo Gothmann.

“As we remember Paul today, what I miss most is learning from him while rehearsing hours in pursuit of our goal,” Kim says. “It was a great privilege for us to present many Minnesota and world premieres of his works with him at the piano.”

Event details

What: Paul & Nigun — Remembering Paul Schoenfield
When: 4 p.m. April 6
Where: Hamline University’s Sundin Music Hall, 1533 Hewitt Av., St. Paul
Tickets: $25; $20 seniors; free for students

Performance Today has selected Grammy-winning performer and composer Jessie Montgomery as the 2025 Classical Woman of the Year. This prestigious title is awarded to exceptional women who have made significant contributions to the world of classical music and who provide inspiration for our listeners.

"I’m thrilled that Jessie Montgomery is our 2025 Performance Today Classical Woman of the Year,” said Fred Child, host and senior editor of the program. “She is a multidimensional musical artist, composer, violinist and educator whose work is having a tremendous positive impact on today's musical scene and on the next generation of musicians and citizens.

“She is a prolific composer of music rooted in her personal and cultural history,” he added, “and creates works that help us understand ourselves and reflect in meaningful ways on the times we live in."

Montgomery also is the founder of the Young Composers Initiative in Chicago, supporting emerging teenage artists. Her work interweaves classical music with elements of vernacular music, improvisation, poetry and social consciousness, making her an acute interpreter of 21st-century American sound and experience. Her music has been described as “turbulent, wildly colorful and exploding with life” by the Washington Post and is performed regularly by leading orchestras, ensembles and soloists around the world.

In June, she concluded a three-year appointment as the Chicago Symphony Orchestra’s Mead Composer-in-Residence. A founding member of PUBLIQuartet and former member of the Catalyst Quartet, she is a frequent and highly engaged collaborator with performing musicians, composers, choreographers, playwrights, poets and visual artists alike.

At the heart of her work is a deep sense of community enrichment and a desire to create opportunities for young artists and underrepresented composers to broaden audience experiences in classical music spaces.

She has been recognized with many awards and fellowships, including the Civitella Ranieri Fellowship, the Sphinx Medal of Excellence and Sphinx Virtuosi Composer-in-Residence, the Leonard Bernstein Award from the ASCAP Foundation, and Musical America's 2023 Composer of the Year. She serves on the Composition and Music Technology faculty at Northwestern University’s Bienen School of Music.

The recognition of Montgomery as the 2025 Classical Woman of the Year highlights not only her individual achievements, but also the importance of supporting and celebrating women in the arts.

Montgomery will be recognized on the March 31 episode of Performance Today, including a conversation with Child about her career and accomplishments.

The Minnesota Orchestra released details for the 2025-26 season this week. It is Music Director Thomas Søndergård’s third season, and among many star-studded moments planned throughout the schedule are performances by cellist Yo-Yo Ma and violinist Leila Josefowicz.

“It’s a season full of amazing vocalists, soloists and orchestral works, and we are delving into the concept of what it means to be American-made,” Søndergård says in a press release. “Audiences will hear works by American-born composers, for certain, but also by composers who resettled in America or sought inspiration here. We’re also exploring works that were premiered or commissioned in the U.S. and were inspired by American history, literature and art. By painting with a very broad brush, we hope to bring to light the interwoven tapestry of American influences, artists and composers who have contributed to orchestral music today.”

The Orchestra’s 123rd concert season begins with a family-friendly Orchestra Hall Open House with backstage tours and live performances on Saturday, Sept. 13.

For access to tickets right away, check out the Minnesota Orchestra’s ticket packages, and single tickets go on sale July 29. For those unable to attend in person, viewing options to be announced at a later date include This Is Minnesota Orchestra on PBS TPT-2 and online, and YouTube. Minnesota Orchestra Friday evening classical concerts will be broadcast regionally on YourClassical MPR stations, continuing a longtime partnership with Minnesota Public Radio. To experience the highlights of the upcoming slate of events, folks can attend 2025-26 Season Sampler concert on Saturday, March 22, for as little as $5.

Classical

Music Director Thomas Søndergård’s third season features collaborations including vocalists Joyce DiDonato, Lauren Snouffer, and Janai Brugger; three programs associated with the latest Nordic Soundscapes festival with pre-concert activities celebrating Nordic culture, cuisine, cocktails and design; the opera-in-concert program of Bartók’s thriller Bluebeard’s Castle; and worldwide phenomenon Yo-Yo Ma performing the Edward Elgar Cello Concerto in March. The full schedule, including holiday-themed programming, follows below. Find more information at the featured links.

Sept. 18 & 19: Søndergård, DiDonato and Strauss with mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato

Sept. 26 & 27: Søndergård and Ross with cellist Anthony Ross
(Friday, Sept. 26 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

Oct. 10 & 11: Kavakos, Mozart and Shostakovich with violinist and conductor Leonidas Kavakos
(Friday, Oct. 10 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

Oct. 16, 17 & 18: Beethoven Fifth Symphony with pianist Elisabeth Brauss
(Friday, Oct. 17 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

Oct. 30 & 31: David Afkham Returns with pianist Janice Carissa
(Friday, Oct. 31 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

Nov. 13 & 14: Søndergård Conducts Symphonie fantastique with violinist Benjamin Beilman
(Friday, Nov. 14 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

Nov. 21 & 22: Søndergård Conducts Brahms Requiem
(Friday, Nov. 21 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

Dec. 4 & 5: Dvořák New World Symphony with violinist Yi Zhao, cellist Erik Wheeler, oboist Kate Wegener and bassoonist J. Christopher Marshall
(Friday, Dec. 5 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

Dec. 31 & Jan. 1: A New Year’s Celebration with the Minnesota Orchestra with pianist Aaron Diehl
(Thursday, Jan. 1 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

Jan. 8 & 9: Nordic Soundscapes Festival - Søndergård and Ehnes
(Friday, Jan. 9 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

Jan. 16 & 17: Nordic Soundscapes Festival - Søndergård Conducts Sibelius with soprano Lauren Snouffer
(Friday, Jan. 16 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

Jan. 30 & 31: Gabel, Debussy and Dukas with violist Rebecca Albers
(Friday, Jan. 30 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

Feb. 13 & 14: Tchaikovsky and Rachmaninoff
(Friday, Feb. 13 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

Feb. 19 & 20: Vänskä, Keefe and Stravinsky with violinist Erin Keefe and conductor Osmo Vänskä
(Friday, Feb. 20 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

Feb. 26: Lunar New Year with Chia-Hsuan Lin and Rui Du leading, and suona virtuoso Yazhi Guo
(Friday, Feb. 26 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

March 3: Yo-Yo Ma with the Minnesota Orchestra

March 6 & 7: Søndergård Conducts Bruckner
(Friday, March 6 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

March 13 & 14: Søndergård, Gerstein and Bernstein with pianist Kirill Gerstein
(Friday, March 13 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

March 19, 20 & 21: Beethoven Symphony No. 9
(Friday, March 20 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

March 27 & 28: Barnatan Plays Rachmaninoff
(Friday, March 27 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

April 9 & 10: Tchaikovsky Symphony No. 6 with violinist Leila Josefowicz
(Friday, April 10 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

April 23 & 24: Brahms Symphony No. 4 with oboist Nathan Hughes
(Friday, April 24 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

May 1: More to Hear: The Listening Project with Music Director Thomas Søndergård and soprano Janai Brugger

May 8 & 9: Søndergård Conducts Wagner and Bartók with mezzo Michelle DeYoung and baritone John Lundgren performing opera-in-concert of Bluebeard’s Castle
(Friday, May 8 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

May 28 & 29: Hindoyan and Rieppel with timpanist Erich Rieppel
(Friday, May 29 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

June 4, 5 & 6: Søndergård, Barton and Prokofiev with mezzo-soprano Jamie Barton performing Peter Lieberson’s Neruda Songs
(Friday, June 5 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

June 12 & 13: Søndergård and Tchaikovsky with pianist Alexander Gavrylyuk
(Friday, June 12 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

June 18: Juneteenth with composer Brian Nabors and Broadway vocalist Melody Betts
(Thursday, June 18 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

Chamber

Four special chamber events featuring Minnesota Orchestra musicians will be held in Orchestra Hall as part of the 25-26 season.

Jan. 10: Nordic Soundscapes Festival - Chamber Music in the Hall with James Ehnes

Feb. 15: Beethoven, Fuchs and Schoenberg

March 29: Poulenc, Bartók and Ravel

May 31: Bacewicz, Bax and Chausson with special guest pianist Inon Barnatan

Live at Orchestra Hall

Curated and primarily conducted by Sarah Hicks, this year’s Live at Orchestra Hall brings together crossover performances with pop music, film soundtracks, and themed holiday concerts. Dessa is back for a pair of performances with the Minnesota Orchestra in November and the psychedelic rock of Pink Floyd is the focus in February 2026. The film offerings include Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back, The Princess Bride, The Goonies and more.

Sept. 30, Oct. 3, Oct. 4 & Oct. 5: Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back in Concert

Oct. 24 & 25: The Goonies in Concert

Nov. 7 & 8: Dessa Returns

Nov. 29 & 30: The Princess Bride in Concert

Dec. 10: Cody Fry Christmas

Dec. 12 & 13: Disney’s The Muppet Christmas Carol in Concert

Dec. 14: Merry & Bright

Dec. 19 & 20: Troupe Vertigo: Cirque Nutcracker

Feb. 6 & 7: The Music of Pink Floyd

Feb. 27 & 28: Ben Rector: Songs for America

April 10, 17 & 18: Disney in Concert: The Sound of Magic

May 15, 16 & 17: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets™ in Concert

June 20 & 21: Disney Pride in Concert

July 16, 17 & 18: Beethoven Triple Concerto with violinist Sarah Grimes and cellist Silver Ainomäe, and guest pianist Alessio Bax
(Friday, July 17 concert will be broadcast live on YourClassical MPR)

Gallery: Beethoven Triple Concerto soloists

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Family

Five events geared directly towards families with young children are part of the new season.

Oct. 18: Fall Sensory-Friendly Concert

Nov. 9: Magnificent Musical Creatures

Feb. 10: Winter Sensory-Friendly Concert

March 15: Symphonic Storytelling

March 28: Spring Sensory-Friendly Concert

For access to tickets right away, check out the Minnesota Orchestra’s ticket packages, and single tickets go on sale July 29.

Read more about Minnesota Orchestra’s new season at minnesotaorchestra.org: Come Together to Listen: Introducing the 2025-26 Season

Few composers accomplish so much in such a short lifetime as Franz Schubert, who died at 31 with a canon of more than 600 vocal works, seven complete symphonies (and one famously “unfinished” one), a large body of chamber music, piano music and song cycles (encompassing the beloved “Ave Maria”). Known for his richly melodic style, he was a bridge of sorts between the worlds of Classical and Romantic composers.

A few highlights of Schubert’s life

• Schubert was born in Austria in 1797 and showed rare musical talent from an early age. His father and his older brother, Ignaz, instructed him in the piano, the violin and viola before he overtook their abilities. Ignaz later said of young Franz’s violin playing, “His progress in a short period was so great that I was forced to acknowledge in him a master who had completely distanced and outstripped me, and whom I despaired of overtaking.”

• At 11, he was introduced to the works of Haydn, Mozart and Beethoven, inspiring him to begin composing his own music. He also studied music theory and composition with composer and music authority Antonio Salieri, who famously was well versed in prodigies, and who was among the first to recognize the breadth of the young Schubert’s talent. In 1815 alone, Schubert wrote nine church works, a symphony and about 150 songs (including eight in one day).

• In his late teenage years, inspired by the development of the piano and the plenitude of late 18th-century lyric poetry, Schubert delved into the works of such literary lions as Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, reinventing the works in musical form. Schubert’s love of melody led to the composition of numerous lieder — that is, German songs of the Romantic period. Perhaps his most famous composition of these teenage years is “Erlkönig,” based on Goethe’s poem of the same name, a technically challenging piece for vocalists and instrumentalists.

• Even though he was lauded as a visionary and had many influential and supportive friends and patrons, Schubert encountered numerous failures in his 20s (a couple of operas that fared poorly and lack of interest from music publishers). He suffered serious health problems as well as financial woes throughout his 20s, but continued writing music at a ferocious pace.

• Perhaps Schubert’s greatest contribution to music was as a composer of lieder, a German song form (singular is lied) of the Romantic period. These 600 songs express every shade of human emotion, demonstrating a deep appreciation for the possibilities of the human voice.

• Schubert's first — and final — public concert on March 26, 1828, was successful enough that it allowed him to finally buy himself a piano. He was able to enjoy it only briefly, however, as he died on November 19 of that same year.

• It is said that when Ludwig van Beethoven was on his deathbed, he listened to some of Schubert's works and exclaimed, "Truly, the spark of divine genius resides in this Schubert!" Appreciation of Schubert’s music during his lifetime was limited to his small circle of Viennese admirers, but in the decades after his death, Schubert was a prime influence on such composers as Felix Mendelssohn, Robert Schumann, Franz Liszt and Johannes Brahms.

A sampling of notable works

• “Gretchen am Spinnrade”: Composed when Schubert was 17, this work (“Gretchen at the Spinning Wheel”), set to a tale from Goethe’s Faust, is credited with creating the “art song.” Here is Renée Fleming’s interpretation.

• “Erlkönig”: The 18-year-old Schubert was said to have composed this lied in an afternoon. He revised it several times before it was first performed five years later. It was hailed at the time as a “masterpiece of musical painting,” “ingenious” and “indelible.” No other performance of Schubert's work during his lifetime would receive more attention than "Erlkönig.” Tenor Daniel Norman interprets it here.
  

• Trout Quintet : This work got its name because the fourth movement is a set of variations on an earlier Schubert song called “The Trout,” originally a warning to young women against being “caught” by “angling” young men. The music also evokes the image of the trout in water and the reaction to it being caught by a fisherman. Here is that fourth movement, played by the Schubert Ensemble.
  

• Symphony No. 8 (“Unfinished”)": This symphony was discovered more than three decades after the composer’s death, when Schubert’s friend, Anselm Huttenbrenner, revealed he had a work that Schubert had sent him 43 years earlier. The work includes two complete movements and an incomplete scherzo composed in 1822, six years before his death (so he had plenty of time to finish it, had he been so inclined). Some believe the symphony’s missing fourth movement is actually the Entr’acte from Schubert’s incidental music for the play Rosamunde. Listen to the iconic first movement, performed by the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra.
  

  
  

• Symphony No. 9: Most Schubert devotees agree that this work deserves its nickname of the “Great Symphony.” Even Schubert knew it: In a letter written in March 1824, the composer says he was preparing to write “a grand symphony.” Composer Robert Schumann discovered the work in a chest after Schubert’s death. “The riches that lay here made me tremble with excitement,” he said. Here is the second movement, played by the Berlin Philharmonic.
  

Widespread acclaim eluded Franz Schubert during his abbreviated lifetime. But today, he is considered one of the greatest composers in the history of western classical music, and his work continues to be widely performed.