Your Brain On Music: Tearjerkers
Putting the "sad" in sad songs
Composers, Music

Your Brain On Music: Earworms
When songs get stuck... get stuck... get stuck... in our brains
Music, Science, Composers

Series: Your Brain on Music
Music, emotions, and imagination have gone together ever since the first cave dweller banged on a rock. Modern brain research is helping us understand why.
Composers, Music, Science

Cuesheet: NSO Family Concert: Tchaikovsky Discovers America
Music! Dance! Chocolate! Take a magical train ride with famous Russian composer and conductor Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, the man behind The Nutcracker and other classical music hits.
Composers, Music, Orchestra, Musical Instruments

Cuesheet: NSO Young People's Concert: Summon the Heroes!
Join the National Symphony Orchestra for a rousing concert celebrating heroes
Composers, Folklore, Music, Orchestra

Cuesheet: NSO Kinderkonzert: Break It Down!
Just like a building made of blocks, music is made with different parts. Explore how music and even musical instruments break down and come together to make amazing music.
Composers, Music, Orchestra, Musical Instruments

Cuesheet: Matt Wilson's Arts & Crafts
Jazz artist Matt Wilson performs with his band Arts & Crafts. In a high-energy performance/demonstration, the band explores the process of improvisation, and shows students how much fun jazz music can be.
Composers, Music, Musical Instruments, Comedy

Cuesheet: NSO Teddy Bear Concerts
This season's Teddy Bear Concerts invite the youngest of music lovers (and their favorite stuffed animal) to join in fun, interactive performances with musicians from the NSO.
Music, Orchestra, Composers

Article: Kids' Classical Countdown
A classical music 101 for families and young listeners
Music, Orchestra, Composers, Family

Arts Quotes: Robert Schumann
"To send light into the darkness of men's hearts - such is the duty of the artist."
Europe, Composers, Music, Music Legends

Arts Quotes: Johannes Brahms
"Study Bach. There you will find everything."
Composers, Music Legends, Music, Orchestra

Arts Quotes: Leonard Bernstein
"Music can name the unnamable and communicate the unknowable."
Music, Composers, Music Legends

Arts Quotes: Benjamin Britten
"Composing is like driving down a foggy road..."
Composers, Music Legends, Music

Arts Quotes: Ludwig Van Beethoven
"Art! Who comprehends her? With whom can one consult concerning this great goddess."
Composers, Music, Music Legends, Orchestra

Arts Quotes: Bela Bartok
"A nation creates music - the composer only arranges it."
Composers, Music Legends, Music, Europe

Arts Quotes: Vladimir Ashkenazy
"I believe that interpretation should be like a transparent glass, a window for the composer's music."
Music, Composers, Orchestra, Music Legends

Arts Days: March 03, 1931: Long May It Wave
On this March day, President Herbert Hoover signed a law officially designating this song as our national anthem. But let’s back up more than 100 years to tell the whole story.

The poem that gave rise to the song was written by Francis Scott Key as he observed—with much anxiety—the bombardment of Baltimore’s Fort McHenry in 1814 by the British navy. Key’s poem about the American flag that “yet waved” after the attack was printed in several newspapers.

Later, it was set to a popular melody by (ironically) a British composer named John Stafford Smith. The subsequent song became very popular and was frequently played at public events like parades. Also, soldiers in the U.S. Army and other members of the military often played it each time the flag was raised and lowered.
Composers, Poetry, America, Music

Arts Days: January 25, 1858: Nuptial Notes
Wedding bells rang on this day in 1858 at the marriage ceremony of Princess Victoria of England to Prince Friedrich of Prussia.

The princess walked down the aisle to German composer Richard Wagner's "Bridal Chorus," and after saying "I do," she and her new husband exited the church to the sounds of the "Wedding March" by German composer Felix Mendelssohn.

Overnight, these songs became the hot music selections for wedding processionals and recessionals. To this day, both songs remain popular, traditional choices in Western weddings.
Popular Culture, Music, Composers, Orchestra

Arts Days: January 07, 1924: George’s Big Break
At 15, American composer and pianist George Gershwin dropped out of school to pursue his passion for music. He got a job in New York City playing the piano for a popular music publisher, and immediately began writing his own music. He had his first national hit, "Swanee," at age 20, but it was another five years until he composed "Rhapsody in Blue."

Written in less than three weeks, the composition's soaring clarinet solo launched Gershwin’s career and began a new era in American music. He went on to write some of America's most popular and important original music, often for Broadway or the concert hall, including the musical scores for Funny Face, An American in Paris, and Porgy and Bess.
Composers, Innovators & Pioneers, Music Legends, Jazz

Article: Cracking Open The Nutcracker
Explore the most popular ballet of all time
Ballet, Dance, Choreographers, Composers, Folklore

Article: Cozying up to Così
A guide to Mozart's hilarious romantic comedy
Opera, Music, Theater, Comedy, Composers

Series: The Story Behind The Song
Through the history of popular songs, discover how history is full of surprising stories of people doing amazing things
History, Music, America, Composers, Military

Series: Master + Work
Meet the masters...the talented artists who have created some of the most outstanding achievements of the twentieth century
Ballet, Choreographers, Composers, Dance Legends, Music Legends

Cuesheet: Iceland Symphony Orchestra: Maximus Musicus Visits the Orchestra
Meet Maximus Musicus, a mouse who discovers many funny and wonderful sounds during his visit to a concert hall. Based upon a popular book, this narrated concert program introduces students to the instruments and sounds of the orchestra.
Composers, Music, Orchestra, Musical Instruments, Animals

Cuesheet: WNO Opera Dress Rehearsal: Manon Lescaut
In Puccini’s Manon Lescaut—a free-spirited and flirtatious lady with a weakness for anything that sparkles meets a dashing young man who steals her heart. True love just isn’t enough for this French girl whose desire for finer things threatens to destroy her happiness, her reputation... even her life.
Backstage, Composers, Music, Europe, Opera