Performance Today®

In 2011, composer Clarice Assad wove together a dozen tunes by Bach. The violas and cellos play the melodies, so it's called the "Suite for Lower Strings, based on themes of Bach." On this weekend's Performance Today, we'll hear this 21st century music - inspired by 18th century music - from a concert in San Francisco.

In 2011, composer Clarice Assad wove together a dozen tunes by Bach. The violas and cellos play the melodies, so it's called the "Suite for Lower Strings, based on themes of Bach." On Friday's Performance Today, we'll hear this 21st century music - inspired by 18th century music - from a concert in San Francisco.

Pianist Helene Grimaud says that in the second half of Brahms' Piano Concerto No. 2, it feels as though you get a private audience with the composer. On Thursday's Performance Today, we'll hear part four of our musical journey with Helene Grimaud and Brahms.

It's day three of our guided tour through Brahms' piano concertos with pianist Helene Grimaud. On Wednesday's Performance Today, we'll hear Grimaud's performance of the first half of Brahms' autobiographical Piano Concerto No. 2.

Pianist Helene Grimaud takes us inside the music of the Piano Concerto No. 1 by Johannes Brahms. She says the music was influenced by Brahms' teacher, Robert Schumann, but dedicated to Brahms' "impossible love," Clara Schumann. Grimaud and the Bavarian Radio Symphony Orchestra and bring this tragic love triangle back to life in a concert in Munich, Germany.

Johannes Brahms composed two monumental piano concertos twenty-three years apart. Starting on Monday's Performance Today, pianist Helene Grimaud leads a four-day exploration of both works, beginning with the youthful energy in the first concerto in D minor.

Rachel Lee Priday is a concert violinist...and she works in the fact-checking department of New Yorker magazine. On this weekend's Performance Today, we'll hear this multi-talented young musician perform a Paganini concerto in concert with the Buffalo Philharmonic.

"Imagine music of such magnitude that it mirrors the entire world." Those words were written by composer Gustav Mahler. On Friday's Performance Today, we'll sample music fired by that same ambition: Mahler's epic Symphony No. 3.

What happens when a young composer writes a masterpiece? On Thursday's Performance Today, the Dover Quartet joins Fred in the studio to explore this question and to perform Barber's unforgettable Adagio for Strings.