It’s that time again! Tuesday marks the beginning of our Spring pledge drive. As you’ve probably noticed, we’re making some pretty rad changes over here at Q2. We’ve brought you more hosts, more weekly programs, more live events, more streaming albums and more mobile listening, and we’d LOVE to continue this rad trajectory, but we simply cannot do this without your help!

Yep, it’s that time again! Time to explore the placed between notes, the tunings that have existed on earth before we even existed, the non-Western-oriented, and the just plain weird. This week, my show will be lousy with microtones!

One of the more provocative concepts introduced to me by a music teacher in my youth had to do with the Hungarian language and accent patterns in the music of Bartok. This week we consider whether a composer's spoken language affects his/her musical language.

This week we'll make our way through some stunning organ works, focusing on its ability to produce sounds massive and miniscule. There will be Messiaen, obviously, but also David Lang and Nico Muhly and a ton of surprises. Tune in and crank up the subs for the earth-shaking organ!

How do we get pieces which translate so beautifully from stage to audience member to translate as comprehensibly to the intimacy of recorded media? This week, I play pieces that are not only musically well-suited to the radio, but are recorded in a way that suits the format as well.

Nothing brings to relief the joy of life more clearly that loosing a loved one. This is one of the hardest lessons of being human, and, not surprisingly, a rich ground for creative material. If you think about it, the Classical tradition, such as it is, has everything to do with revering the dead. We deify composers posthumously, lauding everything they have created in an ecstatic, ongoing memorial.

This Sunday at 2 pm, join us as we revisit the New Juilliard Ensemble's dynamic 2010-2011 season. The noted student ensemble takes on a varied array of contemporary concert works.

Stravinsky famously said: "Music is, by its very nature, essentially powerless to express anything at all." Q2's Nadia Sirota doesn't buy it: "It seems totally out of place given the way his music moves me."

As numerous ads for sunny getaways in the subway temptingly imply, let's face it: there's no better time of year to get out of town than February. But if your wallet won't have it, here's a modest solution, let Q2 Music take you on a quick trip to some of New Music's hot spots around the world.

Composing isn't always a solitary activity. This week, Nadia Sirota explores a variety of different composer collectives, including Bang On a Can, the NOW Ensemble, Sleeping Giant, Ears Open!, and Common Sense.

We open this week's show with an interview with the multi-stylistic multi-instrumentalist Jherek Bischoff, a performing guest in the upcoming Ecstatic Music Festival Preview concert in The Greene Space on Wednesday, February 1.

Kung Hei Fat Choi! When I was in kindergarten, my super awesome teachers Ms. Danielson and Ms. Doane had us bring in paper bags, in which we cut holes three holes (a big one in the very bottom and two smaller ones on the sides), adorned with construction paper scales, and pulled over our heads to march down the hallway of our school as a giant, kindergartener-fueled Lunar New Year dragon. It was pretty much the best day of kindergarten.

It may sound kind of obvious, but one of the perks of working at this station is constantly being exposed to new music. This week, we are celebrating Polish music from the past 50 years or so, and I’m happy to say that aside from the heavy hitters (cough, Penderecki, Górecki, cough) this music is basically all completely new to me! Not just new, but both awesome AND new.

This is a really special week on the show. While I know you’ve become accustomed to my riffs on the providence of music written by people who are still alive, this week we get to hear about everything – from inspiration to circumstance to execution – right from the mouths of the creators. That’s right, this week I’ll be joined by a dozen or so composers who will guide us through the lion’s share of this week's programming.

Hey there, 2012, you’re looking mighty fine! Every time I cross the threshold of a new year, I cannot help but think of it as a mild miracle of time travel. Remember the first time, in grade school, a classmate bid you farewell for the weekend with the remark “see you next year?” It was mind-blowing!

TEN! NINE! EIGHT! SEVEN! SIX! Wait wait!! We’re not quite there yet!! We still have a few precious moments left of 2011, and even more pertinently, just a few more days left until the twenty eleven charitable donations deadline!! What better way to sort out your 2011 taxes than to make a tax-deductible donation to your favorite locale on the internet for all things new and wonderful, Q2 Music!

This week, in celebration of some of the longest nights of the year, Q2 Music is exploring music about the stars, planets, celestial bodies and other glittery, wintry nighttime things.