This Week at The Classical Station
by Chrissy Keuper
Friday, 11 July 2025
Happy Friday, Listeners!
We’re playing your requests and dedications all day today for All-Request Friday and do it again tomorrow on the Saturday Evening Request Program (6pm-12am ET).
Want to see what’s on the list?
Want to make requests and dedications for next week?
On this date in classical music history:
Bramwell Tovey rehearsing the Orchestra of Opera North in the Royal Albert Hall, London, March 2012. (Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)
It’s the birthdate of British conductor and composer Bramwell Tovey in Ilford, London, in 1953. Tovey studied piano and composition at the Royal Academy of Music (where he also took up the tuba) and the University of London, while also conducting BBC music broadcasts and playing with the London Symphony Orchestra. He was staff conductor for the London Festival Ballet; music director of the the Scottish Ballet; principal conductor of Sadler’s Wells Royal Ballet; the D’Oyly Carte Opera Company; the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra (where he also helped establish the New Music Festival); music director of the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra (VSO) and the Luxembourg Philharmonic Orchestra; and then principal conductor of the BBC Concert Orchestra. Tovey also conducted the New York Philharmonic’s summer concert series; served as Artistic Director of the National Youth Brass Band of Great Britain and the Fodens Brass Band; and principal guest conductor of the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s Hollywood Bowl summer concerts. His compositions include a Cello Concerto (premiered in Winnipeg in January 2001) and a work for a large choir and brass band (Requiem for a Charred Skull, which won a 2003 Juno Award for Classical Composition of the Year). He wrapped up his busy career as Director of Orchestral Activities at the Boston University School of Music; artistic advisor to the Rhode Island Philharmonic Orchestra; and guest conductor of the Sarasota Orchestra.
Thursday, 10 July 2025
A very, very Happy Friday Eve to you, Listeners!
This evening, Thursday Night Opera House features the 1971 recording of Richard Bonynge conducting the London Symphony Orchestra, the Ambrosian Opera Chorus, and stellar soloists in Giuseppe Verdi’s Rigoletto. The jester Rigoletto (Sherrill Milnes) in the court of the Duke of Mantua (Luciano Pavarotti) seeks revenge for the Duke’s seduction of Rigoletto’s daughter, Gilda (Joan Sutherland).
Join Dr. Jay Pierson at 7pm ET for this classic tragic opera.
On this day in classical music history:
Helen Donath. (© Frank Heller)
A very Happy Birthday to American soprano Helen Donath (née Ewing), born in Corpus Christi, Texas, in 1940. Donath spent more than 50 years on the stage as both a concert/Lieder singer and in opera, including the Opernstudio at the Cologne Opera; Staatsoper Hannover; Michigan Opera Theatre; the Vienna State Opera; the Metropolitan Opera; the Salzburg Festival; the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden; La Scala, Milan; and others. In addition to performing, she also spent many years as a voice teacher/coach.
Wednesday, 9 July 2025
Hello, Listeners!
We hope you’re having an excellent week and are enjoying some great classical music.
On this date in the history of classical music:
David Zinman, c. 2022. (Courtesy of Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich)
A very Happy Birthday to American violinist, composer, and conductor David Zinman, born in 1936 in Brooklyn, New York. Zinman studied violin at Oberlin Conservatory of Music, then theory and composition at the University of Minnesota, before his first conducting gig at Tanglewood from 1958 to 1962 and as an assistant conductor to Pierre Monteux in Maine from 1961 to 1964. He went on to conduct the Netherlands Chamber Orchestra; the Rotterdam Philharmonic Orchestra; the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra; and the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra. Zinman was music director of the Ojai Music Festival (with co-director, pianist Mitsuko Uchida) and of the Aspen Music Festival and School, where he founded and directed American Academy of Conducting. His next move was to Switzerland as music director of the Tonhalle-Orchester Zürich, including the orchestra’s first-ever appearance at The Proms in 2003. Throughout, Zinman made some of classical music’s best-known recordings with a number of orchestras. He retired in 2014 and remains one of the world’s most highly-respected conductors.
Tuesday, 8 July 2025
Thank you for supporting The Classical Station since 1978.
We are honored to broadcast great classical music 24-hours a day for your listening pleasure,
and we would be exponentially honored if you would consider a gift of support to keep classical music on the airwaves and online.
On this date in the history of classical music:
Louis Wayne Ballard
It’s the birthdate of Native American composer Louis Wayne Ballard in 1931 near Miami, Oklahoma. He studied at the University of Oklahoma, Northeastern Oklahoma A&M (where he graduated in music theory), and at the University of Tulsa (where he earned a degree in music education). Though most of Ballard’s training and education were in Western classical music traditions, he was deeply influenced by the music and dance of Native American traditions and inspired by Bela Bartok’s use of Hungarian folk themes, among other composers. He was the first Native American to receive a graduate degree in music composition when he graduated from the University of Tulsa with a master’s degree in composition (1962). Ballard was music director for the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico (1962-1968) and National Curriculum Specialist for the Bureau of Indian Affairs (1968-1979); and he wrote and published American Indian Music for the Classroom (1973) for teachers who wanted to incorporate American Indian music in their curriculum. Among the awards Ballard received over his career were four National Indian Achievement Awards; the Distinguished Service Award from the U.S. Central Office of Education; a Lifetime Musical Achievement Award by the First Americans in the Arts; the Cherokee Medal of Honor; a Rockefeller Foundation Grant; a Ford Foundation Grant; and five grants from the National Endowment for the Arts. He is also regarded as the father of Native American composition in the classical music world.
Monday, 7 July 2025
Listeners, it’s a new week, and we’ll be filling it with wonderful classical music!
This evening at 7pm ET, join Vince Tillona for Drop the Needle and the warmth of vinyl recordings. This week’s show features Deutsche Grammophon’s recordings of the Berlin Philharmonic playing classics by Beethoven and Brahms.
And at 8pm ET, Monday Night at the Symphony spotlights the Tonhalle Orchestra Zurich and includes works by Beethoven, Ravel, and Mahler. See you at the symphony!
Tomorrow, join George Leef on Classical Café for this week’s Legendary Performer: Stanislaw Skrowaczewski.
On this date in classical music history:
Gian-Carlo Menotti, c. 1944. (Photo by Carl Van Vechten – Courtesy of Library of Congress)
It’s the birthdate of Italian-American pianist and composer Gian-Carlo Menotti in 1911 in Cadegliano on Lake Lugano. Menotti was ultimately best known for his operas and wrote his first at the age of ten (The Death of Pierrot). He had written another by the time he entered the Milan Conservatory at age 13. Menotti began studies at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia in 1927 and then wrote his opera Amelia Goes to the Ball. It was such a success at the Curtis Institute in 1937 that the Metropolitan Opera included it in their next season. He is credited as the first composer to create American opera that became part of the world’s permanent opera repertoire, including Amahl and the Night Visitors and the Pulitzer Prize-winning The Saint of Bleecker Street.