Bravo Bavaria

From Mozart's Idomeneo to Strauss' Capriccio to Unsuk Chin's Alice in Wonderland. All made their world premieres at the Bavarian State Opera in Munich. Works by Weber, Wagner, Salieri, Zemlinsky, Penderecki, Korngold and many others were first performed at this operatic hotbed.

WFMT's extends its Octoberfest celebrations with a Munich/Bavaria week, October 12th through the 19th.

Throughout each day, you'll hear a wide array of Bavarian State Opera performances from Baroque to contemporary styles. And be sure to tune in to WFMT's The Unrush Hour, weekdays at 5pm. Unrush Hour will be devoted exclusively to Bavarian State Opera performances for the week of 10/12-10/16. The special Munich/Bavaria week will also include many recordings by the Bavarian State Orchestra and Bavarian Radio Orchestra led by the likes of Kent Nagano, Zubin Mehta, Mariss Jansons, Wolfgang Sawallisch, Lorin Maazel, Hans Knappertsbusch and other past and present masters.

Tune in for this special week of operatic tradition from Bavaria and WFMT.

Bavarian Baroque



Munich Mozart



Prey/Wunderlich

Jeffrey Siegel

Jeffrey joins us for a morning Impromptu today on WFMT...playing a Chopin program. Here he is with Brahms...

All-Poland Day

WFMT celebrates Polish American History Month with an all-Polish lineup on Thursday, October 1. Hear Wieniawski, Paderewski, Lutoslawski, Gorecki, Szymanowski, Mlynarski, Penderecki, Lipinski, Panufnik, Poldowski...and a bit of Chopin. And check out some of the beautiful sights and sounds of this rich land...

Kracow



Warsaw



More sights of Poland



World Orchestra for Peace, Kracow 2009



Not a Polka



The Great Horszowski



Henryk Szeryng

Music by Louis Elbel

This one's for Carl Grapentine. Go Blue!

Yea Clarinet!

I'm a violinist myself. But the woodwind players here at WFMT have pointed out that Thursday, August 13 is the birthday of Johann Denner - widely considered to be the father of the clarinet. So we decided - time a clarinet solo! It's clarinet day on WFMT, and we bring you Mozart, Brahms, Debussy, Copland and much more. And of course, some video prominently featuring the clarinet.

Special thanks to long-time Chicago Symphony Orchestra clarinetist, DePaul teacher and Chicago Chamber Musicians Co-Founder Larry Combs for commenting on much of the clarinet music presented Thurday on 98.7. Larry also tells the story of Denner and shares his own story about how he came to the clarinet. It's pretty funny, so you'll have to listen...

CSO and Tchaikovsky 4th - some good looks and listens to Larry Combs!



Beautiful Stolzman performance of Copland



What would Denner think?

Happy Birthday Raymond Leppard

We celebrate the prolific conductor's 82nd birthday, Tuesday, August 11 on WFMT with many of Leppard's recordings. Raymond Leppard also kindly obliged to an extended interview with WFMT's Noel Morris - and you can hear excerpts from that conversation all day Tuesday on 98.7. Still more on Leppard...including this bio highlighting many of his accomplishments:

http://www.indianapolissymphony.org/about_us/the_conductors/raymond_leppard

And some videos of today's honoree...enjoy!

A video tribute to Raymond Leppard:



An excerpt from the 1963 Peter Brooks film Lord of the Flies...scored by Raymond Leppard:



Some home video of Leppard conducting the Indianapolis Symphony in Beethoven's 9th:

James Ehnes, Korngold and More

We feature violinist James Ehnes on Monday morning August 10 in our 10am hour. The Korngold Violin Concerto performance you'll hear shares its 3rd movement with the soundtrack from the 1937 Errol Flynn film, The Prince and the Pauper. Here's a bit from that Hollywood classic.



Also from Ehnes, a few moments from his recent video, Homage, a showcase for Ehnes' artistry on some of the greatest instruments of all time...