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What Makes It Great From Beethoven to Broadway, pianist and composer Rob Kapilow reveals the heart of the music with a touch of humor and humility.
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What Makes It Great

Pianist and composer Rob Kapilow reveals the heart of the music with a touch of humor and humility.
A Languid Look Back To Gershwin's 'Summertime'

American composer George Gershwin in 1925. Hulton Archive/Getty Images hide caption

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A Languid Look Back To Gershwin's 'Summertime'

Gershwin placed his song "Summertime" at the beginning of his opera Porgy and Bess, and for good reason. Pianist and composer Rob Kapilow demonstrates how, in just a few measures, Gershwin transports the listener into the languid world of Catfish Row.

Hear 'Summertime' And What Makes It Great

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Felix Mendelssohn's Genius In 40 Seconds

The Octet, which Mendelssohn wrote when he was only 16, continues to inspire with its originality and genius. Wikimedia Commons hide caption

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Felix Mendelssohn's Genius In 40 Seconds

Commentator Rob Kapilow unfolds the opening, fugue-like layers of Felix Mendelssohn's Octet for strings, revealing the most fantastic 40 seconds ever written by a 16-year-old.

Hear What Makes The Octet So Great

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The Pure Power Of Handel's 'Hallelujah Chorus'

Simplicity, it turns out, is the secret to the success of Handel's ever-popular "Hallelujah Chorus." istockphoto hide caption

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The Pure Power Of Handel's 'Hallelujah Chorus'

American Public Media

Composer-commentator Rob Kapilow examines what makes Handel's "Hallelujah Chorus" one of the best known — and best loved — pieces in all of music. He says the exuberance is powered by a few deceptively simple techniques.

Hear What Makes The 'Hallelujah Chorus' So Great

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'Over The Rainbow,' From Kansas To Oz

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'Over The Rainbow,' From Kansas To Oz

In the first entry of the series What Makes It Great, pianist and composer Rob Kapilow uncovers the secret to the success of "Over the Rainbow." At the piano, Kapilow demonstrates that the complete emotional narrative lies in the song's brilliant opening measures.

Hear 'Over the Rainbow' And What Makes It So Great

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Robert Schumann's Childhood Dreams

Robert Schumann's music evokes the image of a child's dreams. iStock hide caption

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Robert Schumann's Childhood Dreams

To mark the 200th anniversary of Robert Schumann's birth, commentator Rob Kapilow takes a look at "Träumerei,"one of Schumann's most quiet, introspective pieces.

Hear What Makes Schumann's 'Traumerei' So Great

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Barber's 'Adagio': Naked Expression Of Emotion

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Barber's 'Adagio': Naked Expression Of Emotion

From sorrow, the music builds to a climax of intensity, and finally reaches serene acceptance. Commentator Rob Kapilow conducts a guided tour of Barber's best-known piece.

Hear What Makes Barber's 'Adagio For Strings' So Great

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A World Of Expression In A Tiny Chopin Mazurka

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Journal des Demoiselles/Wikimedia Commons

Chopin At 200

A World Of Expression In A Tiny Chopin Mazurka

American Public Media

Chopin had the courage to believe that the expression contained in a three-minute Mazurka for solo piano could be as powerful as the expression in an entire four-hour Wagner opera. Hear pianist and composer Rob Kapilow, and radio host Fred Child, explain what makes Chopin great.

Mazurka for piano No. 13 in A minor, Op. 17/4, CT. 63

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'Cheek To Cheek': The Melody Lingers On

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'Cheek To Cheek': The Melody Lingers On

Top Hat, from 1935, featured Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers. But commentator Rob Kapilow says the real star of the movie is Irving Berlin's classic song, "Cheek to Cheek."

Hear What Makes Berlin's 'Cheek To Cheek' So Great

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Beethoven's Kreutzer Sonata Connections
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Beethoven's Kreutzer Sonata Connections

Beethoven whittles the world down to its essence in his "Kreutzer" Sonata for violin and piano. Commentator Rob Kapilow demonstrates how, with just two little notes, Beethoven connects an entire universe.

Sonata for violin & piano No. 9 in A major ("Kreutzer"), Op. 47

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Janacek's Love Letters, With Strings Attached

Czech composer Leos Janacek sent a non-stop stream of more than 700 love letters to a much younger, married woman; she inspired many of his best works. iStock hide caption

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Janacek's Love Letters, With Strings Attached

Leos Janacek's personal and powerful String Quartet No. 2 was inspired by the unrequited love he held for a much younger, married woman — and by the 700 letters he wrote to her.

Hear What Makes Janacek's String Quartet No. 2 So Great

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Mozart's Deceptive Simplicity

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Mozart's Deceptive Simplicity

Hear commentator Rob Kapilow demonstrate how Mozart sets up our expectations but takes us in unpredictable directions in the String Quintet in G minor. His music, like a hologram, flashes back and forth between the simple and the complicated.

Hear What Makes Mozart So Great

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Aaron Copland's American Vision

Aaron Copland captured the sound of America's wide open spaces with surprisingly simple techniques. iStock hide caption

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Aaron Copland's American Vision

Commentator Rob Kapilow explains how Copland's pure, American sound springs from two simple chords that open the ballet Appalachian Spring. Stacked upon each other, the chords reveal a sound like all of America, like the purest values, and like Shaker simplicity.

Hear What Makes 'Appalachian Spring' So Great

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'Petrushka': Stravinsky's Opaque Reality

The music Stravinsky wrote for the ballet Petrushka is layered with ideas of the real and the artificial. Wikimedia Commons hide caption

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'Petrushka': Stravinsky's Opaque Reality

Commentator Rob Kapilow uncovers the genius beneath the layers of Stravinsky's great ballet, Petrushka, and recalls how it inspired him to follow a career in music.

Hear What Makes 'Petrushka' So Great

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Steve Reich: Minimalism In The Mainstream

Composer Steve Reich's Music for Mallet Instruments, Voices and Organ has a percussive motor that never stops. Courtesy of the artist hide caption

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Courtesy of the artist

Steve Reich: Minimalism In The Mainstream

Commentator Rob Kapilow takes the motor-like rhythms of minimalism out for a test drive. He explains that the music is "about making us alive to the differences that are everywhere beneath the surface, if we only listen closely enough."

Hear What Makes Steve Reich's Music So Great

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Stephen Sondheim's Clever 'Clowns'
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Stephen Sondheim's Clever 'Clowns'

While discussing Sondheim's quintessential song "Send in the Clowns," commentator Rob Kapilow reveals that, like other great song composers, Sondheim doesn't really set words to music. Instead, he focuses on the emotion behind the words.

Send in the Clowns

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Debussy: A World Revealed In Two Footsteps
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Debussy: A World Revealed In Two Footsteps

Is it possible to write music that sounds like an icy landscape? Claude Debussy succeeded in a Prelude he called "Footsteps in the Snow," taking the solo piano to places it had never been before.

Hear What Makes "Footsteps In The Snow" So Great

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Bold Beginnings: The Art Of The Opening Notes

An attention-grabbing opening can be the key to a successful composition. Wikimedia Commons hide caption

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Bold Beginnings: The Art Of The Opening Notes

You never get a second chance at a first impression, the old adage goes. At the start of the new year, Rob Kapilow describes how it works for composers, who want to set a certain tone from the very opening notes of their works.

Hear What Makes A Great Musical Opening

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Verdi's Brilliantly Inauthentic 'Ave Maria'

Verdi trumps Shakespeare by inserting a hauntingly beautiful "Ave Maria" into his operatic version of Othello. Universal Classics hide caption

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Universal Classics

Verdi's Brilliantly Inauthentic 'Ave Maria'

When Verdi set out to make Othello into an opera, he didn't worry about getting Shakespeare absolutely right. Rob Kapilow unveils Verdi's inappropriate yet vividly dramatic makeover of one seemingly innocent scene.

Hear What Makes 'Ave Maria' From Verdi's 'Otello' Great

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A Depression-Era Anthem For Our Times

A bread line forms outside of the Rescue Society in New York City in 1929. "Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?" directly confronted the hardship of the Great Depression. Wikimedia Commons hide caption

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A Depression-Era Anthem For Our Times

"Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?" depicts the way the American Dream can dissolve into bread lines and bankruptcy. Commentator Rob Kapilow and Susan Stamberg reveal the secret to the Depression-era anthem's success — and discuss its resonance today.

A Depression-Era Anthem For Our Times

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The Power Behind 'America The Beautiful'

America's amber waves of grain inspired teacher Katharine Lee Bates to write the poem later used in the song "America the Beautiful." Wikimedia Commons hide caption

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The Power Behind 'America The Beautiful'

Pianist, composer and conductor Robert Kapilow joins Fred Child to explore why the simple and direct song "America the Beautiful" has the ability to touch listeners so deeply. Election Day is a fine time to explore its timeless pull on America's heartstrings.

America the Beautiful

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