Monday - Friday at 7:00 pm
An expedition through the world of classical music.
Exploring Music is an adventure. Each week, we pick a theme and follow the music wherever it leads us. Over the years we’ve explored Shakespeare and music, have followed the lives of many composers (a sort of five-part mini-series), and visited the music of various locales — Paris, Venice, Spain, Hungary, the Pacific Rim. Each five-episode program is a musical journey that focuses on a particular genre, music festival, or classical theme. It’s a sort of Outward Bound for music, with the host as our guide to make sure we all get home safe and sound.
Listeners' emailed suggestions have played an important role in selecting themes. We’ve recorded over two hundred adventures, and the ideas keep turning up. We don’t think we’ll exhaust the possibilities. Exploring Music is familiar and welcoming, and is where you feel at home on your first visit and can’t wait to get back to sample what the series has come up with for its next five-episodes.
Walton, William
June 22, 2026
Composer Benjamin Britten once wrote that hearing William Walton’s music was a “great turning point in his musical life.” We’ll trace the arc of Walton’s life and his associations with the greatest artists of his time, including Heifetz, Hindemith, Olivier, and Beecham. Bill features Walton’s love of different musical genres; Film music from Henry V, the poem Façade set to ...
Symphony, Part X: Alexander Scriabin to Samuel Barber
June 15, 2026
This week, Bill McGlaughlin continues his multi-part exploration of this vibrant, exciting musical form with symphonies written between 1900 and 1920. Bill focuses on works rarely heard in concert, or on the radio for that matter: Alexander Scriabin’s Symphony No. 3 conducted by Riccardo Muti, an important interpreter of the Scriabin color wheel; George Enescu’s Symphony No. 2; and Samuel ...
Haydn and Mozart Quartets
June 8, 2026
Mozart’s six “Haydn” Quartets were dedicated and lovingly handed to Joseph Haydn, like a father entrusting his sons to a friend to protect and guide them. When Haydn first started composing for the string quartet, the first violinist was the star, actually standing in front of the other three players. Ninety-nine Haydn string quartets later, the form had evolved into ...
Gershwin, George
June 29, 2026
Join us for a week-long look at the life and soulful music of George Gershwin, including his Rhapsody in Blue, An American in Paris, and Porgy and Bess. A true American original, George Gershwin transcended musical categorization as he composed in almost any form: Broadway musicals, popular songs, symphonic works, and jazz. In only 38 years of life, Gershwin followed ...
Voices from the East
July 13, 2026
With mechanical consistency, a lone bell creates a meditative sound. Very slowly, strings begin shimmering through the image by playing canonic scales. This Cantus in Memory of Benjamin Britten, written by Estonian composer Arvo Pärt, will be the first piece we hear in this week’s program Voices from the East. Throughout the week, our musical journey brings us to composers ...
Symphony, Part IV
July 13, 2026
We start this week featuring the symphonic form at its Romantic apex, with Austrian composers Anton Bruckner and Gustav Mahler, then we cross the English Channel to Britain to listen to the music of Edward Elgar. Twenty-two symphonies among the three of them, and more remarkable since Bruckner was in his forties before he composed his first, and Elgar had ...
