Q2 continues to celebrate Carnegie Hall's Spring for Music Festival with this May 10 program from 5 to 8pm featuring the faculty of the Bard College Conservatory. Though New York City is home to some of the most prestigious American music schools, one should never overlook the fact that a mere one-hundred miles north, in tranquil Annandale-on-Hudson, is a school whose star-studded faculty list includes the likes of Dawn Upshaw, So Percussion, George Tsontakis, Jeremy Denk, David Krakauer, Joan Tower and members of the Guarneri Quartet.

Tonight, Saturday May 7 from 5 to 8pm, Q2 continues Spring Fever with a sonically immersive primer for WQXR's upcoming live Carnegie Hall, Spring for Music broadcast of the Toledo Symphony performing works by André Previn and Dmitri Shostakovich.

This Friday from 5-8pm, in anticipation of WQXR's kick-off Spring For Music broadcast from Carnegie Hall featuring the Orpheus Chamber Orchestra, Q2 presents a Spring Fever spotlight on the evocative sound worlds of two featured composers, Aaron Jay Kernis and Paul Moravec. Q2 also turns over the microphone to the composers themselves, as they provide exclusive insights into their own works, from Moravec's Tempest Fantasy to Aaron Jay Kernis's String Quartet No. 2, "musica instrumentalis," both pieces awarded the Pulitzer Prize in Music.

As part of our deep dive into the music of English composer Gavin Bryars, we offer on-demand insight and commentary on numerous pieces from the composer himself. Hear the exclusive introductions throughout Never Failed Me Yet followed by the related pieces or listen to the unabridged versions of the composer's commentary in our permanent archive below.

A few weeks ago, Q2 and NPR Music launched a crowdsourced project to determine who were your favorite composers under the age of 40, and by extension those pieces which were shaping our contemporary musical scene and defining what it actually means to be a composer in the 21st century. On Facebook, Twitter and the aggregating pages on Q2 and NPR Music, an international array of comments poured in, reaching almost 800 suggestions in total. With much debate and awareness of such a list's limitations, we've narrowed the field down to 100 composers, each represented by one song, and are proud to present it here in a randomized stream.

Enjoy a collection of photographs provided by the composer himself of recent live performances, longtime collaborators and even members of the Bryars family - performers in their own right.

While filming material for a 1971 documentary by Gavin Bryars’s friend Alan Power focused on people living in impoverished areas in London, the filmmaker crossed paths with a singing vagrant who offered an improvised and affecting profession of faith with the words "Jesus' blood never failed me yet..."

Each day from April 14-20, Q2 spotlights the mind and music of composer Gavin Bryars. Explore the many different aspects of a style informed by jazz, minimalism, Renaissance polyphony and constant experimentation.

What are your thoughts on the music of Gavin Bryars? Are there pieces your fellow listeners should look out for? How would you describe his style? Perhaps you remember exactly where you were the first time you heard Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet? Have you performed his music? What stories about the man or his music would you like to share? Q2 wants to know. 

NPR Music and Q2 want you to help us program a special music stream featuring composers under 40! Send us the names of your favorite composers, and, if you have specific favorite albums or pieces, let us know.

This week, Q2 launches the 13-week Spring 2011 season of our flagship show, Cued Up, with the first encore presentation of one of the more mesmerizing evenings in our recent live Webcast history.

Tonight at Symphony Space: vocalist Theo Bleckmann presents his re-imaginings of the songs of Kate Bush, the British singer-songwriter who skyrocketed to fame in the mid-80's.

The inaugural Ecstatic Music Festival at Merkin Concert Hall closes this March with its most concentrated month of ambitious programming to date. Featuring six concerts and two Webcasts on Q2, the festival's culmination epitomizes music-making at its most collaborative and experimental.

Merkin Concert Hall's Ecstatic Music Festival blazes into February with concerts from the Bang on a Can All-Stars, Roomful of Teeth, Newspeak and Darcy James Argue's Secret Society. Listen below to get the perspective of composer and festival curator Judd Greenstein as he continues his series of introductions to this month's imaginative, cross-pollenating pairings, two of which will be Web cast live on Q2 as part of New Sounds Live with WNYC's John Schaefer.

This two-hour, 70th-birthday celebratory episode of WNYC host Tim Page's groundbreaking series New, Old and Unexpected is the culmination of Q2's archival look at the life and times of recently deceased composer and pedagogue Milton Babbitt. This immersive, unparalleled interview with the seminal 20th century composer paves the way for host Nadia Sirota's exploration Friday at 8 p.m. on Q2 of how Babbitt forever changed our contemporary musical landscape and language.

In this 1973 interview from the WNYC archives, Milton Babbitt speaks with legendary announcer Martin Bookspan. Included are live concert recordings of performances that were not commercially available at the time.

As opinions from across the spectrum of musically-minded come in about the passing of Milton Babbitt's passing, we thought we'd launch Q2's audio coverage with a 1985 Meet the Composer interview of Milton Babbitt with longtime WNYC host Tim Page. Listen Friday evening at 8 p.m for Q2 host Nadia Sirota's deep audio rich dive into the life and music of Milton Babbitt, with insights from many of Babbitt's closest colleagues, collaborators and students.

In advance of the Metropolitan Opera premiere of John Adams' opera Nixon in China Q2 is presenting all four of his operas as well as his one oratorio, El Niño, every night this week at 7 pm.

Composer Judd Greenstein recently came by the WQXR studios to explain the impetus behind Merkin Concert Hall's first ever Ecstatic Music Festival: an ambitious, 14-concert festival he's created as an experimental model for fostering collaboration among artists of different musical fields. In addition, Greenstein took us on a focused, guided tour through each intriguing concert pairing.