Special for the holiday season, this week The Brothers Balliett offer music designed to accompany the obligatory fire-staring that is so much a part of this time of year. This music is designed to help you zone in, zone out, forget the world and focus on the fire.

The music of John Luther Adams seethes with the serenity and savage violence of his Alaskan home, particularly in works like In the White Silence and Earth and the Great Weather. Listen to his Mixtape.

It's the time of year when candles are lit, presents are exchanged, thanks are given, and – here at Q2 Music – we indulge in two hours of hyper-modern, ravishingly beautiful keyboard music via Olivier Messiaen.

Q2 Music celebrated the centenary of legendary Polish composer Witold Lutosławski with a live audio webcast from Symphony Space featuring a performance by the American Contemporary Music Ensemble. Hear the entire show on-demand. 

Charles Wuorinen befriended Edgard Varèse and Igor Stravinky in his youth and has collaborated with the likes of Salman Rushdie and Annie Proulx. Today at 3 pm he joins the Brothers Balliett for an interview and listening session.

Composer Gregory Spears has collaborated with So Percussion, Eighth Blackbird and JACK quartet among others. His Mixtape illustrates his fascination with the parallels between early and contemporary music--a juxtaposition that appears frequently in his own music.

New Yorkers needn't travel far to hear music from a great composer, and this week on Hammered! we follow suit with a week's worth of borough-hopping playlists that survey New York City's young composers.

If there's one thing that the Brothers Balliett have learned from Rothko, it's that monochromaticism, in art OR music, is not necessarily a bad or boring thing. This week we explore ensembles built entirely of one sound color. Listen Thursday at 3 pm.

The music of Daniel Lopatin – aka Oneohtrix Point Never – is at once futuristic and in constant conversation with the past. His Mixtape collides Renaissance master Orlando Gibbons with contemporary experimentalist Paul Lansky. Listen Wednesday at 3 pm.

This past November, violinist Hilary Hahn performed her most recent encore-commissioning project, "In 27 Pieces," live from Greenwich House. Stream excerpts this week. 

No ambiguity here. No broader historical context required. No chicken / egg complex. This week we listen to five piano concertos preluded by the smaller piano pieces from which they came.

Does an aural representation of geography exist, or does "landscape" take on a new meaning when applied to music? Today at 3 pm, the Brothers Balliett explore landscape music by John Cage, Harrison Birtwistle and Brian Fernyhough.

The music of composer Anna Thorvaldsdottir paints textured sonic pictures as hazy and mystical as the as the landscape of her native Iceland. Listen to her Mixtape.