Performance Today®

"The lessons of humility are endless." Those are the words of pianist Abdel Rahman El-Bacha. He says that when he realized the audience was there to hear the music, and not to hear him perform musical acrobatics, it helped him to conquer his stage fright. Now, he believes concerts are moments of "pure beauty to be shared." El-Bacha shares his performance of Rachmaninoff's first piano concerto with us today, along with JoAnn Falletta and the Buffalo Philharmonic.

Legendary Swan Songs: the final concert performances by three 20th century masters. Leonard Bernstein was almost 72 years old in the fall of 1990, conducting a concert by the Boston Symphony. He'd been suffering from emphysema for several years. In the third movement of Beethoven's Symphony No. 7, Bernstein began coughing and couldn't stop. The concert almost came to a halt, but somehow Bernstein controlled his coughing fit, and kept going. We'll hear the final movement from that performance...which turned out to be the last notes of Bernstein's final concert. Also, the final delicate encore from Vladimir Horowitz at age 83 in Hamburg. And highlights from the last concert by violinist Nathan Milstein, in Stockholm in 1986.

Today we're observing President's Day with two hours of special programming. Music inspired by Presidents Abraham Lincoln and John F. Kennedy, and music by several presidential favorite composers, Louis Moreau Gottschalk and Johann Strauss, Jr. Plus performances by the United States Marine Band, also known as the President's Own. And a quirky string quartet written by the only American president who was never actually president, Benjamin Franklin.

Violinist Nicola Benedetti defies conventional wisdom. When she was a finalist at the BBC Young Artist Competition, she didn't play an impressive, well-known warhorse. She chose the obscure and wildly atmospheric Violin Concerto No. 1 by Karol Szymanowski. She won. That led to a 1.7 million dollar major-label recording contract, and now at age 22, she's still playing that Szymanowski concerto. Nicola Benedetti with the Brabant Orchestra, in concert at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. Also: Bruce Adolphe has a new Piano Puzzler, and this week's caller (from Lawton, Oklahoma) plays his piano right back at Bruce, over the phone.

The 2010 Winter Olympics begin today in Vancouver, British Columbia. Over 2600 athletes from nearly 100 countries will be competing, all looking for a little Olympic magic. In honor of the games, we have Jerry Neil Smith's "The Magic of the Mountain," from Oklahoma's Quartz Mountain Music Festival. Plus, Viktoria Mullova wraps up our week of terrific women violinists, performing the Beethoven Concerto in Beethoven's home town.

We'll meet the winner of the 2010 Sphinx Competition for young African-American and Latino string players: 24 year-old violinist Gareth Johnson. And we'll hear his winning performance from Sunday night in Detroit, the final movement from the Violin Concerto No. 3 by Camille Saint Saens. Plus: pianist Jon Nakamatsu and clarinetist Jon Manasse are back for day two of music and conversation in the studio. They'll play a pair of virtuosic movements from the Grand Duo for Clarinet and Piano by a contemporary of Beethoven, Carl Maria von Weber. And a pair of rags written for them by American composer John Novacek.

Violinist Nicola Benedetti defies conventional wisdom. When she was a finalist at the BBC Young Artist Competition, she didn't play an impressive, well-known warhorse. She chose the obscure and wildly atmospheric Violin Concerto No. 1 by Karol Szymanowski. She won. That led to a 1.7 million dollar major-label recording contract, and now at age 22, she's still playing that Szymanowski concerto. Nicola Benedetti with the Brabant Orchestra, in concert at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. Also: Bruce Adolphe has a new Piano Puzzler, and this week's caller (from Lawton, Oklahoma) plays his piano right back at Bruce, over the phone.

Composer Igor Stravinsky and fashion designer Coco Chanel. They knew each other in Paris in the 1920s, they even worked together. Did they also have a torrid affair? A new movie says they did...we may never know for sure. We'll hear from a project they shared, the ballet "Apollo." He wrote music, she designed costumes. Highlights from Stravinsky's music on the way from a concert at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, Neeme Jarvi conducting the Philharmonic Orchestra of the Hague.

All this week, we're featuring terrific women violinists in concerto performances. Today's soloist is Dutch violinist Janine Jansen, playing the Dvorak concerto in Australia. And for those suffering from cabin fever, we've got a cure. Some musical vacations are on the way, from downhill skiing, to a vacation on the Italian Riviera, to a stop at a fashionable French cafe.