Theme & Variations introduces a new topic each week, presenting a wide range of music associated with that theme. Drawn from a millennium of Western classical music, the selections are an eclectic mix of familiar favorites and rarities. Theme and Variations is produced locally in Discover Classical's studios by host Joe Law.
It’s time to return to the musical form this program is named for, with variations on operatic themes, along with the (often unfamiliar) operatic themes themselves. The operas are by Vincenzo Bellini, Giacomo Meyerbeer, W. A. Mozart and Gioacchino Rossini; the variations are by Ludwig van Beethoven, Carl Czerny, Franz Liszt, Nicolo Paganini and Anton Reicha.
This week you’re invited to travel back a century for music composed or premiered in 1925. The composers are Ernest Bloch, Jacques Ibert, Paul Hindemith, Erwin Schulhoff, Edgard Varèse, Ralph Vaughan Williams and William Walton.
What’s in a name? This week’s program explores that question with music by composers who used pseudonyms. They’re best known as Kenneth J. Alford, Claude Arrieu, Stanley Dickson, Werner Egk, Giacomo Meyerbeer, Mrs. Philharmonica, Poldowski, Giovanni Punto, Henri Sauguet, Èmile Waldteufel and Peter Warlock.
Discover Classical turns 40 on November 11. This week’s program throws an early birthday party with music composed especially for birthdays. The musical greetings are by J. S. Bach, Peter Heidrich, Clara Schumann, Dmitri Shostakovich, Johann Strauss II, Richard Strauss, Igor Stravinsky and Peter Warlock.
