

Arts Feb 01

A symphony requires all musicians playing their parts in harmony, but the pandemic makes that delicate choreography all the more challenging. Jeffrey Brown talks to maestro Michael Tilson Thomas about that and passing the baton to a younger generation as…
By Jeffrey Brown, James Blue, Tommy Walters
Arts Jan 18

In a musical tribute to COVID victims, Washington state’s Vancouver Symphony Orchestra performed Samuel Barber’s sorrowful “Adagio for Strings” inside a largely empty concert hall and for an audience online.
By Joshua Barajas
Arts Mar 30

Krzysztof Penderecki, an award-winning conductor and one of the world's most popular contemporary classical music composers whose works have featured in Hollywood films like "The Shining" and "Shutter Island," died Sunday. He was 86.
By Monika Scislowska, Associated Press
Arts Mar 18

Yo-Yo Ma, one of the world’s most renowned and beloved musicians, is trying to provide comfort in this time of crisis. Ma has been posting videos of himself performing short pieces and encouraging other musicians -- of all levels --…
Dec 17

By Dr. Howard Markel
It is a query that has invited many diagnoses over the last 200 years.
Young musicians in Poland are reviving what they are calling the country’s golden era -- which was cut short by the Nazi invasion and World War II. Dances from the 1930s such as the foxtrot and tango are making a…

By Jeffrey Brown, Anne Azzi Davenport
Gaelynn Lea is transforming our cultural understanding of who can be a musician. A congenital disability called osteogenesis imperfecta caused her bones to break more than 40 times while she was in the womb. But the violinist is known for…

By Kaitlyn Locke, WGBH News
Seconds after an orchestra stopped playing Mozart's "Masonic Funeral Music" at the Boston Symphony Hall last week, 9-year-old Ronan Mattin was so swept away by the music that he loudly exclaimed -- for the whole auditorium to hear -- "Wow!"…
Musician and critic Jennifer Gersten wants us to transform the way we think about classical music. Perceived by many as “inaccessible, elitist, incomprehensible,” the genre is often marketed by producers and performers primarily as relaxing. Gersten shares her humble opinion…
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