Suzanne Bona

The extraordinary violinist Kelly Hall-Tompkins is featured in today’s Beautiful Music. She has teamed up with Urban Playground Chamber Orchestra, conducted by Thomas Cunningham. They’re performing Florence Price’s exciting Violin Concerto #2. Make sure you read the program notes on the concert video, which give some important context about the composer. You can also use […]

Today’s Beautiful Music is a fantastic concert performance of George Gershwin’s opera PORGY AND BESS. The 2019 performance features soprano Adina Aaron, and bass-baritone Musa Ngqungwana, with the Cape Town Opera Chorus, and Frankfurt Radio Symphony, conducted by Andrés Orozco-Estrada. You can use the Metropolitan Opera’s synopsis of PORGY AND BESS using the link below.

Bass-baritone Jonathan Woody’s powerful, expressive artistry provides today’s Beautiful Music. This concert performance is from a March 2023 of George Frideric Handel’s oratorio MESSIAH with Washington Bach Consort. Mr. Woody is the soloist performing “Why do the nations so furiously rage together,” followed by the chorus, “Let us break their bonds asunder.” Jonathan Woody is

I’ve had the great fortune to interview flutist Brandon Patrick George twice. You can hear our conversations by clicking on the links below. Brandon Patrick George trained at Oberlin Conservatory of Music, the Conservatoire de Paris, and the Manhattan School of Music. He is flutist with Imani Winds, and a busy soloist whose repertory ranges

Today’s Beautiful Music is a captivating, jazzy improvisation featuring the rising star violinist Randall Goosby and double bassist/composer Xavier Dubois Foley. Randall Goosby is a graduate of The Juilliard School, and Xavier Dubois Foley is a graduate of The Curtis Institute of Music. Both musicians also attended The Perlman Music Program located on Shelter Island,

Rochester, NY-born musician Adolphus Hailstork is a Professor of Music and Eminent Scholar at Old Dominion University in Norfolk. Dr. Hailstork trained at Manhattan School of Music, at the American Institute at Fontainebleau with Nadia Boulanger, and at Howard University, and earned his doctorate in composition from Michigan State University. A prolific composer, his expansive

Violinist Kelly Hall-Tompkins is an internationally acclaimed soloist and chamber musician. She also channels her musical passion as an entrepreneur promoting classical Music and social justice causes. In 2005, she founded Music Kitchen Food for the Soul, which brings top level classical music performances to people experiencing homelessness. There’s a link below to Music Kitchen’s

In 2015, double bass player Chi-chi Nwanoku CBE founded Chineke! to provide career opportunities for Black and ethnically diverse classical musicians in the UK and Europe. Chineke!’s mission is: ‘Championing change and celebrating diversity in classical music’. Today’s Beautiful Music is Chineke’s October 2020 performance at Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall, in a concert entitled

British musician Wayne Marshall is a pianist, organist, and conductor. The versatile performer has had a wide variety of prominent positions in the international classical music world, including Chief Conductor of WDR Funkhaus Orchestra Cologne and Principal Guest Conductor of Orchestra Sinfonica di Milano Giuseppe Verdi; and conductor of the first performance of Chineke! at the

Tennessee native Andrew Brady is a 2013 graduate of The Colburn School Conservatory of Music who earned the Principal Bassoon position with Saint Paul Chamber Orchestra beginning in the 22/23 season. He’d previously held the Principal Bassoon position with Atlanta Symphony Orchestra starting in January 2016. Today’s Beautiful Music is an excerpt from Andrew Brady’s solo