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Today’s Beautiful Music features some talented young singers. The USC Thornton Chamber Singers perform BATTER MY HEART by Richard Nance. The choral work is based a poem by English poet John Donne (1572-1631), one of his 19 Holy Sonnets. The award-winning American composer has written music for the choirs of Pacific Lutheran University (where he was once […]

Composer Marcelle Soulage lived from 1894–1970, and sometimes used the pen name Marc Sauval. Her French parents lived in Peru when she was born, but moved back to France when Marcelle was 4 years old. At 5 she started her piano lessons, which eventually led to her studying with the legendary teacher Nadia Boulanger. Today’s

Johann Sebastian Bach’s Suites for Unaccompanied Cello have been inspiring musicians for centuries. Composer Chad “Sir Wick” Hughes (b. 1977), a Detroit native, graduated from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor with a B.Mus in Composition, M.Mus from Kansas State University. As a U of M student he first heard Bach’s Suites wafting from the

Today’s Beautiful Music features a wonderful and important Mexican composer from the baroque era: Manuel de Zumaya. He was a church musician who worked as a Chapelmaster in Mexico City, and traveled abroad, bringing back some European influences. Use the link below to learn more about Manuel de Zumaya’s life and career. This June 2023

Today’s Beautiful Music is an exciting piece of music given a thrilling performance by some top-tier instrumentalists! Bela Bartok composed his Sonata for Two Pianos and Percussion in 1937, and as you listen to the third movement (Allegro non troppo) you’ll instantly hear how extraordinary it is as a composition. This performance is from a

Raphaël Feuillâtre is a young French guitarist who plays with ease, elegance, and finesse. His many awards include winning the 2018 Guitar Foundation of America competition and ADAMI’s Classical Revelation 2021. According to his website, “Driven by a desire to pass on his passion for music and the guitar, ” … Raphaël teaches at the Pont Supérieur

The English Horn is not English, and it’s not a member of the brass family of instruments as the word “horn” might suggest. English Horn — aka cor anglais — is the alto member of the oboe family, with a deeper timbre. Cally Banham is the English Horn player for the St. Louis Symphony, and

Haydn Wood was a British composer and violinist who lived from 1882-1959. He studied at the Royal College of Music, and wrote approximately 200 compositions. Today’s Beautiful Music is one of them — a tone poem he composed in 1918. Ernest Tomlinson conducts the Slovak Radio Symphony Orchestra playing Haydn Woods cheerful MAY DAY OVERTURE.

Quick — when I say “Abbey Road Studios” what’s the first thing you think of?? The Beatles, of course! So can you imagine what a thrill it is for musicians to use Abbey Road Studios for their recordings? Today’s Beautiful Music is the terrific WindSync woodwind quintet from a concert performance of an excerpt (Back

French baroque era musician Francois Couperin composed a piece called Les Barricades Mystérieuses. The title of the 1717 solo harpsichord composition has inspired great speculation over the centuries about its meaning, and a variety of interpretations. Today’s Beautiful Music features A DIVINE DANCE — a Thai classical dance interpretation of Couperin’s tantalizing composition.