Saturday, March 1, at 1:00 pm - note early start time
Giuseppe Verdi: Otello
Verdi's tragedy was first performed in 1887, with an Italian libretto by composer and poet Arrigo Boïto, based on Shakespeare's play. Otello is Moorish, a general in the Venetian army, and governor of Cyprus. He is very much in love with his young Venetian wife, Desdemona. Their happiness begins to erode, however, when Iago, Otello's ensign who is angry and bitter after being passed over for promotion, begins to plot against Otello. He lies and sets up misleading circumstances to convince Otello that Desdemona is betraying him with Cassio, Otello's lieutenant and Iago's rival. Iago's vicious manipulations succeed only too well, provoking Otello into jealous rage against his innocent wife, and ending in murder and suicide. Semyon Bychkov conducts this production.
Renée Fleming (Desdemona); Johan Botha (Otello); Carlo Guelfi (Iago)
Saturday, March 1, at 8:00 pm
Dick Wallace hosts this locally produced folk music show. Playlists are available at the Music Americana archive page.
Saturday, March 1, at 9:00 pm
Harry O'Donoghue hosts this locally produced Celtic music program. Playlists are available at the Green Island archive page.
Sunday, March 2, at 12:00 noon
Guests Imani Winds
Jeff Scott: Titilayo
Valerie Coleman: Steal Away
Pavel Haas: Wind Quintet, Op. 10: movements I and II
Miguel del Aguila: Quintet No. 2
Sunday, March 2, at 1:00 pm
This week's program comes from our home base at Jordan Hall in Boston. An outstanding quartet from Walnut Hill School play a work by Erwin Schulhoff, and then add in a double bass to form a quintet and perform a new work by 18-year-old composer Stephen Feigenbaum. We'll also hear performances by flutist Daquise Montgomery, 17, from Greenville, South Carolina; violinist Anna Lee, 11, from Bayside, New York; and pianist Kerensa Gimre, 15, from Banks, Oregon.
Thursday, March 6, at 8:00 pm, and Sunday, March 9, at 10:00 pm
Franck: The Accursed Horseman
Chopin: Piano Concerto No. 2
Berlioz: Romeo et Juliette (excerpts)
(Robert Spano, conductor; Garrick Ohlsson, piano)
Friday, March 7, at 8:00 pm
Guest Jeremy Monteiro
Pianist and vocalist Jeremy Monteiro is known as "Singapore's King Of Swing." From his home base in the bustling South East Asian metropolis, Monteiro performs, teaches, and organizes festivals throughout Asia and around the world. He performs an original, "Asiana," and McPartland joins in for Ellington's "Cotton Tail."
Saturday, March 8, at 1:30 pm
Gaetano Donizetti: Lucia di Lammermoor
Donizetti's 1835 tragedy, based on Walter Scott's novel The Bride of Lammermoor, is one of the quintessential operatic stories of madness, death, and true love failing to conquer all. Lucia of Lammermoor, emotionally vulnerable in her grief over the recent death of her mother, is pressured by her scheming brother Enrico to marry Arturo for the benefit of the family and Enrico's own political fortunes. But Lucia is in love with Edgardo, a member of a rival clan and Enrico's enemy. Angry with her, Enrico forges a letter to convince her that Edgardo is unfaithful, and Lucia, heartbroken, finally agrees to marry Arturo. Edgardo arrives to claim her, but too late, since she has already signed the marriage contract. Feeling betrayed, Edgardo curses her, and Lucia collapses. Edgardo and Enrico plan a duel at dawn. But Lucia goes completely mad, kills Arturo, hallucinates, and finally dies. Lamenting, Edgardo stabs himself to join his beloved Lucia in heaven. The conductor is James Levine.
Natalie Dessay (Lucia); Giuseppe Filianoti (Edgardo); Mariusz Kwiecien (Enrico); John Relyea (Raimondo)
Saturday, March 8, at 8:00 pm
Dick Wallace hosts this locally produced folk music show. Playlists are available at the Music Americana archive page.
Saturday, March 8, at 9:00 pm
Harry O'Donoghue hosts this locally produced Celtic music program. Playlists are available at the Green Island archive page.
Sunday, March 9, at 12:00 noon
Guests The KSS Trio (Ani Kavafian, violin; David Shifrin, clarinet; Andre-Michel Schub, piano)
Mozart: Trio in Eb for clarinet, viola and piano, K. 498
Bartok: Contrasts: Verbunkos (Recruiting Dance), Sebes (Fast Dance)
Schumann: Märchenerzählungen ("Fairy Tales"), Op. 132: movements III and IV
Sunday, March 9, at 1:00 pm
From the famed Music Hall in Cincinnati, this program features a lineup of great young musicians all from that musical hotbed known as Kentuckiana (aka Greater Cincinnati). We'll hear the Cincinnati May Festival Youth Chorus, directed by James Bagwell; violinist Sophie Pariot, age 14, from Loveland, Ohio; pianist Kevin Bao, age 10, from Mason, Ohio; cellist Christoph Sassmannshaus, 17, from Cincinnati; and the Fresh Winds Trio (Thomas Kraynak, tenor saxophone, 18; Morgan Ferris, alto saxophone, 17; and Tom Turner, baritone sax, 18, all from West Chester, Ohio).
Thursday, March 13, at 8:00 pm, and Sunday, March 16, at 10:00 pm
Haydn: Symphony No. 83 (The Hen)
Chausson: Poème
Ravel: Tzigane
Saint-Saëns: Organ Symphony
(Robert Spano, conductor; Viviane Hagner, violin)
Friday, March 14, at 8:00 pm
Guest Benny Golson
Sax player Benny Golson has been a jazz innovator for many years. Golson got his start with Benny Goodman, Dizzy Gillespie, Lionel Hampton, and Art Blakey. Many of his tunes have become jazz standards. Golson and McPartland perform his classic "I Remember Clifford" and Ellington's "Prelude to a Kiss."
Saturday, March 15, at 1:30 pm
Benjamin Britten: Peter Grimes
A poem by George Crabbe was the basis of Britten's tragedy, which premiered in 1945. Peter Grimes is a fisherman in a small English village, disliked by most of his neighbors, who are suspicious of his role in the death of his late apprentice during a storm at sea. Wanting to make enough money to stop fishing, buy a store, and marry Ellen Orford, the widowed schoolmistress who is one of his few friends, Grimes takes on another apprentice, John, a boy from the workhouse. The hostile villagers suspect Grimes of abusing the boy, and all go to his hut to confront him. Hearing the mob approach, Grimes rushes John out the back door, when the boy slips and is killed falling down the cliff. Grimes escapes in his boat. When he finally returns, deranged and raving, he finds the villagers hunting him again, having found evidence of John's death. Grimes sails out again to kill himself, and when the villagers are told of a sinking boat, no-one tries to help. Donald Runnicles conducts this production.
Patricia Racette (Ellen Orford); Anthony Dean Griffey (Peter Grimes); Anthony Michaels-Moore (Balstrode)
Saturday, March 15, at 8:00 pm
Dick Wallace hosts this locally produced folk music show. Playlists are available at the Music Americana archive page.
Saturday, March 15, at 9:00 pm
Harry O'Donoghue hosts this locally produced Celtic music program. Playlists are available at the Green Island archive page.
Sunday, March 16, at 12:00 noon
Guests The Sixteen with Harry Christophers, director
Antonio Lotti: Crucifixus a 8 (text from the Creed)
Thomas Tallis: In ieunio et fletu (In Fasting and Weeping)
Thomas Tallis: If ye love me
Thomas Tallis: Salvator mundi (Antiphon for Good Friday)
Gregorio Allegri: Miserere (Psalm 51 - Ash Wednesday)
Thomas Tallis: Suscipe quaeso
Tomas Luis de Victoria: O vos omnes (Responsory at Matins for Holy Saturday)
William Byrd: Ave verum corpus (Passiontide)
Tomas de Victoria (Vere languores)
John Tavener: Hymn to the Mother of God
Sunday, March 16, at 1:00 pm
A trip to Nazareth College in Rochester, New York, finds more than snow - it turns out upstate New York is home to some pretty talented young musicians.
Thursday, March 20, at 8:00 pm, and Sunday, March 23, at 10:00 pm
Milhaud: The Creation of the World
Debussy: Sacred and Profane Dances
Ravel: La Valse
Ravel: Noble and Sentimental Waltzes
Gershwin: An American in Paris
(Robert Spano, conductor; Elisabeth Remy Johnson, harp)
Friday, March 21, at 8:00 pm
Guest Jimmy McPartland
Jimmy McPartland was one of the great cornet players from the early jazz era and is the late husband of Marian McPartland. Piano Jazz celebrates the jazz legend's centennial with a special concert from the Danny Kaye Playhouse at the 2007 JVC Jazz Festival. Host McPartland gathered a group of Jimmy's former bandmates for an hour of traditional jazz music.
Saturday, March 22, at 12:30 pm - note early start time
Richard Wagner: Tristan und Isolde
Wagner wrote his own text for this 1865 opera, based on a Celtic romance. Isolde is a proud Irish princess, skilled in herbs and magic, who is being escorted to Cornwall by Tristan for a forced marriage to Tristan's uncle, King Marke. Attracted to Tristan, she yet wants vengeance against him for his role in the death of her former fiancé, Morold. Isolde instructs her maid Brangäne to mix a poison potion, and invites Tristan to drink it with her. Understanding she means to poison them both, he still drinks, but they do not die. Brangäne has made a love potion instead, and the two are now passionately in love. Even after her enforced marriage to King Marke, their affair continues, until the jealous knight Melot denounces them to the King and then attacks Tristan. Severely wounded, Tristan is taken home to Brittany, where he is tended by his best friend Kurwenal. Finally Isolde arrives and he falls into her arms, dying. King Mark follows her, intending to pardon the lovers, but he is too late. Isolde, seeing a vision of Tristan beckoning her to the next world, joins him in death. The conductor is James Levine.
Deborah Voigt (Isolde); Michelle DeYoung (Brangäne); Ben Heppner (Tristan); Eike Wilm Schulte (Kurwenal); Matti Salminen (King Marke)
Saturday, March 22, at 8:00 pm
Dick Wallace hosts this locally produced folk music show. Playlists are available at the Music Americana archive page.
Saturday, March 22, at 9:00 pm
Harry O'Donoghue hosts this locally produced Celtic music program. Playlists are available at the Green Island archive page.
Sunday, March 23, at 12:00 noon
Guests The Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra, directed by Ruggero Allifranchini
Franz Schubert: Rondo in A major for Violin and Strings, D. 438
Astor Piazzolla: The Four Seasons of Buenos Aires: movements II and I
Franz Josef Haydn: Symphony No. 15 in D major
Sunday, March 23, at 1:00 pm
It's the Pipsqueak Extravaganza! This week's program showcases the tiniest tykes presented over the past couple of seasons into one show. An 11-year-old pianist who can barely reach the pedals conquers Debussy. A 12-year-old violinist makes a show piece by Wieniawski sound easy. It's superb music making and lighthearted fun all with kids who have yet to see the age of 13. Our youthful performers include: cellist Oliver Aldort, age 11, from Newton, Massachusetts; pianist Kevin Lu, 11, from Newport News, Virginia; violinist Eunice Kim, 12, from San Bruno, California; flutist Helen McGarr, 12, from Lindon, Utah; pianist Sarina Zhang, 8, from San Diego; and the Gioco String Quartet (cellist Ben Lash, 11; violist Nicholas Lash, 13; violinist Emma Steele, 12; and violinist Hannah Selonick, 12) from Chicago.
Thursday, March 27, at 8:00 pm, and Sunday, March 30, at 10:00 pm
Adams: On the Transmigration of Souls
Brahms: A German Requiem
(Robert Spano, conductor; ASO Chorus; Gwinnett Young Singers; Twyla Robinson, soprano; Mariusz Kwiecien, baritone)
Friday, March 28, at 8:00 pm
Guest Toots Thielemans
Toots Thielemans is the unrivaled master of the jazz harmonica. His trademark style and tender sound is recognized the world over. With a list of recording credits that includes film scores and commercials, Thielemans is a legend who has worked with all the greats from Ella Fitzgerald to Quincy Jones. He exchanges stories with McPartland and joins her for "Giant Steps" and "Georgia."
Saturday, March 29, at 1:30 pm
Giuseppe Verdi: Ernani
Honor trumps true love in Verdi's 1844 drama, based on the French play Hernani by Victor Hugo, set in Spain in 1519. Don Juan of Aragon, having lost his title and wealth during a civil war, takes the name Ernani and leads a band of outlaws in the mountains. He goes to rescue his beloved Elvira, who is about to be forced to marry her uncle, Don Ruy Gómez de Silva, and arrives just in time to save her from being abducted by Don Carlo, the King of Spain, who also wants her. Silva and Ernani, though hating each other, suspend their quarrel long enough to seek vengeance against their mutual enemy, the King. Once they have killed Don Carlo, Ernani says, his life will be in Silva’s hands. As pledge, Ernani gives Silva a hunting horn: when it is sounded, Ernani will kill himself. Don Carlo captures the conspirators just as he is elected Holy Roman Emperor. Having vowed to rule wisely in future, he pardons them and agrees to the marriage of Elvira and Ernani. The happy couple are celebrating when the horn sounds and Silva appears to demand the fulfullment of Ernani's oath. He stabs himself and dies in Elvira's arms. This production is conducted by Roberto Abbado.
Sondra Radvanovsky (Elvira); Marcello Giordani (Ernani); Thomas Hampson (Don Carlo); Ferruccio Furlanetto (da Silva)
Saturday, March 29, at 8:00 pm
Dick Wallace hosts this locally produced folk music show. Playlists are available at the Music Americana archive page.
Saturday, March 29, at 9:00 pm
Harry O'Donoghue hosts this locally produced Celtic music program. Playlists are available at the Green Island archive page.
Sunday, March 30, at 12:00 noon
Guest Leif Ove Andsnes, piano
Robert Schumann: Four Piano Pieces, Op. 32
Ludwig van Beethoven: Piano Sonata No. 31 in A-flat Major, Op. 110
Federico Mompou: Canción y Danzas
Sunday, March 30, at 1:00 pm
This week, From the Top comes from the Huntsville Chamber Music Society in Alabama, with a show featuring outstanding musicians from 13 to 18 years old, including a typically "weird" bassoonist (that's her word) and a young guitarist whose stomach has a name! And special guest, soprano Angela Brown, tells the amazing story of how she discovered classical music because of a teacher in Huntsville. She'll also sing Mozart with a wonderful teenage soprano. Our performers are: bassoonist Kian Andersen, 16, from Harvest, Alabama; pianist Carter Pelham, 18, from Huntsville, Alabama; guitarist Travis Johnson, 13, from Milwaukie, Oregon; and soprano Natalie Ballenger, 16, from Santa Cruz, California.
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Page updated 2/25/08