Performance Today®

Benjamin Franklin invented the glass harmonica, and Mozart wrote music for this unusual instrument. On Friday's Performance Today, we'll go to a concert in Meiringen, Switzerland, to hear Mozart's music for the glass harmonica.

Conductor Simon Rattle has known The Nutcracker since he was a kid, and with each passing year he becomes more fascinated with the music. On Thursday's Performance Today, Simon Rattle conducts the Berlin Philharmonic in The Nutcracker "B-sides;" the sometimes overlooked, but still heart-tugging and toe-tapping dances from the rest of Tchaikovsky's beloved ballet.

It's a busy musical season! On Wednesday's Performance Today, Bruce Adolphe joins us with this week's Piano Puzzler. Plus, we'll have winter concert highlights from around the country, including a virtuosic performance of Strauss' Til Eulenspiegel's Merry Pranks.

Robert Schumann wrote his Piano Concerto in A Major for his great love -- his wife, pianist Clara Schumann. On Tuesday's Performance Today, we'll hear Martha Argerich play Schumann's musical poetry of love, from a concert in Switzerland.

What's the point of musical technique? According to pianist Andre Watts, technique allows you to create at will what you hear in your inner ear. On Monday's Performance Today, we'll hear what's going on in Watts' inner ear when he plays Rachmaninoff's Piano Concerto No. 2 in concert in Houston.

Beethoven borrowed a tune from a popular opera when he wrote his Gassenhauer Trio; it was a song that everybody was singing in Vienna in 1797. On this weekend's Performance Today, we'll hear a performance of Beethoven's Trio from an all-star concert in Bridgehampton, New York.

Hector Del Curto's great-grandfather and grandfather both played tango in Buenos Aires. Now, he carries on that tradition, as one of today's great masters of tango. On Friday's Performance Today, we'll hear Del Curto play the bandoneon in concert at the Aspen Music Festival.

Sometimes the sound of the L.A. Philharmonic is so big, you would think it could move mountains. On Thursday's Performance Today, we'll go to Los Angeles to hear the orchestra perform with earth-shaking results.

Beethoven borrowed a tune from a popular opera when he wrote his Gassenhauer Trio; it was a song that everybody was singing in Vienna in 1797. On Wednesday's Performance Today, we'll hear a performance of Beethoven's Trio from an all-star concert in Bridgehampton, New York.