Timothy Judd, Suzuki Violin Lessons – Suzuki Violin Lessons in Richmond, VA and more…

Latest Listeners’ Club Posts

Andy Akiho’s “Pentalateral I”: Sandbox Percussion March 27, 2026

The music of American composer Andy Akiho (b. 1979) is infused with the sounds of the Caribbean. Based in Portland, Oregon and New York City, Akiho is a virtuoso percussionist whose primary instrument is the steelpan, a drum developed in Trinidad and Tobago in the 1930s. According to his biography, As a pannist, Akiho has a deeply physical […]

Schumann’s “The Bride of Messina” Overture: Music for a Greek Tragedy March 25, 2026

Friedrich Schiller’s 1803 tragedy, The Bride of Messina, tells the story of a bitter rivalry between brothers who have fallen in love with the same woman, Beatrice. She turns out to be their long-lost sister. Amid jealous discord and a clash between paganism and Christianity, the turbulent love triangle ends in a murder-suicide. The two-act […]

Bach’s “O Lamm Gottes, Unschuldig,” BWV 618: Canon Alla Quinta March 23, 2026

Typically, a musical canon involves a melodic line which is imitated by one or more voices after a set duration, resulting in a magical contrapuntal layering. In the chorale prelude for organ, O Lamm Gottes, unschuldig (“O Lamb of God, innocent”), BWV 618, Bach expanded on this idea by creating a canon “alla quinta” (“canon at the fifth”). […]

“The Two of You”: Early Sondheim March 20, 2026

Sunday marks the 96th anniversary of the birth of American composer and lyricist Stephen Sondheim (1930-2021). In 1952, long before musicals such as West Side Story, Sweeney Todd, and Into the Woods brought him fame, the 22-year-old Sondheim submitted a song to Kukla, Fran and Ollie, a popular television show involving puppets. Broadcast fr […]

Rimsky-Korsakov’s “The Golden Cockerel”: Excerpts from a Dark Fairytale Opera March 18, 2026

Completed in 1907, The Golden Cockerel was the last opera of Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov. Based on an 1834 poem by Alexander Pushkin, its fairytale plot unfolds over three acts, bookended by a prologue and epilogue. The story involves the bumbling Tsar Dodon. “Advised by an Astrologer, Dodon uses a magical cockerel (a young male rooster) to war […]

Remembering Hjálmar Helgi Ragnarsson March 16, 2026

Icelandic composer Hjálmar Helgi Ragnarsson passed away last Friday, March 13. He was 73. Ragnarsson left behind a wide range of music including symphonic works, operas, incidental music, songs, and film scores. He was a respected music theorist, and served as president of the Federation of Icelandic Artists, and rector of the Iceland Unive […]

Vaughan Williams’ “Rest”: A Choral Setting of Christina Rossetti March 13, 2026

Christina Rossetti’s sonnet, Rest, presents death as a serene eternal sleep which provides relief from earthly pain. It is part of her collection, Goblin Market and Other Poems, published in 1862. In 1902, Ralph Vaughan Williams set the poem for a cappella chorus. It unfolds in a gentle, flowing 3/4 time. At the poem’s midpoint, the word “p […]