Bach as Muse

From the neon flicker of a glowstick to the summer sparkle of a lightning bug, composer Jessie Montgomery finds musical inspiration in the science of light. Tune in today to hear the Sphinx Virtuosi perform Montgomery's 'Chemiluminescence' at a recent concert presented by Boston's Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum.

John Adams says the final movement of "Road Movies" is for four-wheel drives only and that the driving should be left to the musicians. Join us for Adams’s musical ride on this episode of Performance Today.

The hurdy-gurdy has strings like a violin, a keyboard, and a hand crank that produces a wheezing drone. Composer Missy Mazzoli was fascinated by this sound and wanted to make an entire orchestra sound like a big hurdy-gurdy. Tune in to Missy Mazzoli’s Sinfonia for Orbiting Spheres on today’s episode.

When clarinetist Anthony McGill and pianist Gloria Chien met in 2006, they bonded over their love of Johannes Brahms's music, a bond that is evident when they play together. They'll play a clarinet sonata by Brahms for us on today's show.

Inspired by Charles Baudelaire's poetry, French composer Henri Dutilleux drew on literary lines to set the mood for a concerto he was working on. Tune in today to hear Dutilleux's Tout un monde lointain (A Whole Distant World), featuring cellist Jan Vogler and conductor Kent Nagano leading the Frankfurt Radio Symphony Orchestra.

Violinist Alexi Kenney challenges the pressure to be perfect in classical music by letting intuition guide his performances rather than succumbing to perfectionism. On today's show, Kenney joins harpist Bridget Kibbey to perform a C.P.E. Bach sonata (Kibbey arranged it for violin and harp) from a recent ChamberFest Cleveland concert.

While exploring a glacier in the Swiss Alps, composer Charles Kwong used underwater microphones to record a trickling stream. Slowing the recordings revealed distinct, marimba-like pitches in the flowing water. This time-shifting inspired Festina lente, meaning "make haste slowly." Overlapping musical textures and timelines make the piece feel both fast AND slow. Today, we’ll hear the Hong Kong Philharmonic Orchestra perform the world premiere of Charles Kwong’s Festina lente, conducted by Lio Kuokman.

In 2017, Aldo López-Gavilán composed a piano concerto based on a simple tune he had written for his daughters. He imagined a beautiful place, full of wonder and curiosities from around the world... a musical emporium. On today's show, we'll hear Aldo López-Gavilán's Emporium, a fusion of classical, gospel, and Afro-Cuban musical traditions.

When English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams traveled to Paris in 1907 to study with Maurice Ravel, Ravel pushed him to broaden his thinking and pursue greater artistic ambition. Vaughan Williams remained grateful for that guidance, forging a lifelong friendship with Ravel while maintaining his distinctive voice. Tune in for music by the ever-original Ralph Vaughan Williams on this episode of Performance Today.

Composer Jimmy Lopez Bellido says the pulse of techno music is instantly recognizable in any dance hall or club around the world —a steady, thumping rhythm you feel in your body. Tune in today to hear the thrilling fusion of techno and world music: Fiesta! by Jimmy López Bellido.