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At only 11 years old, cellist Jivan Ramesh is already a jack-of-all-trades.

Writing music can be a tough job, especially when your opinions run counter to the government, you are under constant surveillance and threat of punishment. Composer Dmitri Shostakovich found one thing, across the span of decades, that took him away from that stress and brought him enjoyment: soccer. Musicologist Dmitri Braginsky has written a new book about Shostakovich's obsession with "the beautiful game."

Rachel Barton Pine is so much more than a violin soloist. This October, she is seeing the start of the next phase of her enormous, 15-year project that adds to her brand publisher, researcher, advocate and educator.

We're celebrating National Hispanic Heritage Month! We had the honor of speaking to Francisco Nunez, a choral conductor who won a 2011 MacArthur Genius Grant, to name one accolade, but his accomplishments are vast. Listen to this excerpt of their conversation in which Mr. Nunez tells us about what got him started, his musical idols, and role models.

Charlie Harmon worked for several years as an assistant to Leonard Bernstein. In his new book On the Road and Off the Record With Leonard Bernstein and in his interview with Fred Child, Harmon describes vividly the October day in 1990 he was called to visit Bernstein and realized it was the last time they would see each other.

Orin O'Brien was the first woman hired to perform full-time with the New York Philharmonic. Watching Leonard Bernstein conduct was certainly exciting for the audience, but this double bassist says it was exhilarating and terrifying to face the conductor as a member of his orchestra. O'Brien calls working with Bernstein "one of the best experiences of my professional life."

It sounds like the set-up for a great punch line. Three composers walk into a restaurant: Leonard Bernstein, Aaron Copland and Michael Tilson Thomas. The first course is challenging musical trivia. The next course involves clanging spoons and glasses. Michael Tilson Thomas describes a memorable dinner with two other American composers.

Conductor, composer, pianist Michael Tilson Thomas says few people realize how rooted Leonard Bernstein was in Jewish Theater. Thomas says that shared interest created an immediate bond between them.

Cellist Evan Kahn is Performance Today's Young Artist in Residence. Evan joins Fred Child in the studio for conversation and music by Tchaikovsky, Martinu, George Kahn (Evan's father!), and more.

Le Pont Mirabeau: New music by Wang Jie, composed during PT's 2018 musical tour of Paris and Normandy.