From the Top

From the Top travels to the Aspen Music Festival and School this week to meet the amazing young musicians who’ve gathered there to study. We’ll hear one of Tchaikovsky’s most playful pieces performed by a talented 16-year-old violinist … we'll hear a wonderfully passionate young pianist perform Preludes by Debussy … and we'll learn how that pianist defied the odds and managed to find his way to America from a very small, rural village in southern China. 

Featuring nearly twice as much music as From the Top’s regular episodes, this “Mostly Music” highlights program celebrates some of the best performances by young people From the Top has presented over the past couple of seasons. We meet a wonderfully quirky 14-year-old cellist, enjoy Mozart performed by a teenager from New York State, and we hear perhaps the strongest teenage baritone From the Top has ever encountered sing the music of Schubert. 

This week's From the Top comes from Vermillion, South Dakota, which happens to be the home of one of the greatest collections of musical instruments in the world. The National Music Museum is in Vermillion and so, in addition to the performances of some incredible young musicians, this episode features the sounds of some of the museum's rare treasures. 

This week’s program comes from the Aspen Music Festival and School in Aspen, Colorado, where many of the world’s top young musicians come to study during the summer. An outstanding teenage violinist from Shanghai triumphs in his performance of one of the most difficult and virtuosic pieces written for unaccompanied violin, and we’ll meet a young flutist with a moving story about being adopted as an 18-year-old into a new family.  

From Calderwood Hall at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston, Massachusetts, this week's From the Top celebrates grassroots community music schools — these are the kind of programs that reach out to kids who otherwise might not have any access to musical training. We'll hear an expressive 17-year-old cellist from the New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts perform the music of Shostakovich. And we'll meet a phenomenal teenage trombone quartet from one of the greatest urban community music schools in the country - the Merit School of Music in Chicago. 

This week’s program was recorded at The Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts and given the show’s art museum venue, each young performer discusses a connection between the music they’re performing and a work of visual art in the museum’s collection.  We hear an award winning string quartet from Chicago perform the music of  Bartok and a teenager from Maryland performs an epic piece on the traditional Chinese instrument, the guzheng.

This week, host Christopher O'Riley catches up with some of From the Top's most illustrious alumni in our annual "Where Are They Now Show." We'll enjoy the extraordinary music these young pros are making in their early careers and we'll hear their stories of triumph and struggle as they work to define their own creative space in the world. Featured alumni include a brilliant young composer who is about to have a concert of his work performed by the Shanghai Philharmonic ... a touring violinist who has just released a CD of all unaccompanied pieces, and a French horn player who has founded a free music school in his home town. 

From the Snow Pond Center for the Arts in Sidney, Maine, this week's From the Top features one of the strongest teenage oboists From the Top has encountered in the past few years performing a gorgeous Elegie by Francis Poulenc ... a 14-year-old violinist performs Vieuxtemp's virtuosic show piece, the Yankee Doodle Variations ... and we meet a harpist who shares some wonderful stories about growing up studying music on rugged and rural Mt. Desert Island, Maine.

From the famous Eastman School of Music in Rochester New York, this week's show features the great flute virtuoso, Sir James Galway as our special guest. In addition to a line up of wonderful young soloists, Sir James will perform Gounod's Petite Symphonie with an ensemble of talented kids, and talk about how he's training the next generation of superb flutists. 

This week's From the Top comes to you from the Texas State International Piano Festival in San Marcos, Texas. Appropriately, all the performances on the program include the piano. We'll enjoy one of Maurice Ravel's best-loved pieces for solo piano performed by an expressive 16-year-old from New Jersey, and we'll hear a new piece for piano and voice written by a composer who's just 13-years-old. 

From Princeton, New Jersey, From the Top celebrates the 75th anniversary of the world renowned, American Boychoir. As our special featured guest, we'll hear them perform the music of Bach, the Beatles, Duruflé, and Sousa. Also on the program, a teenage cellist performs Fauré's "Elegie", and we'll meet a brilliant young violinist who has won three major American music competitions this past year. 

From El Paso Texas this week's From the Top features an extremely expressive 13-year-old clarinetist from California, performing the music of Weber, a hugely confident teen violinist from El Paso performing Wieniawski's Polonaise Brilliante … and a young organist who wins From the Top's Stereotype Smasher of the Year award. 

From Jordan Hall in Boston, Massachusetts, this week's From the Top features “The Lark” by Mikhail Glinka brought to life by a wonderfully musical 11-year-old pianist. We'll also enjoy some unaccompanied Bach performed by a very thoughtful teenager from the Boston area … and a teenage string quartet shares moving stories about the healing power of music in their own lives. 

 This week From the Top presents Carnegie Hall's National Youth Orchestra of the Unites States.  Featuring phenomenal young musicians from nearly every state in the union, this massive ensemble of over 100 performers delivers heart-stopping performances of the music of Bernstein, Gershwin, and a world premier of a work by American composer, Samuel Adams. We'll also hear some of the orchestra’s strongest performers play chamber music with host Christopher O'Riley. 

From Chattanooga, Tennessee, this week's From the Top features an uproarious performance of the music of Japanese composer/pianist Hiromi Uehara, performed by a 14-year-old girl from nearby Maryville, Tennessee … We'll also hear from a young singer who has raised over $14,000 for arts programs at the local schools … and a local teenage guitar quartet serenades us with a classical arrangement of an Appalachian folk song.