The Cambridge Union Society was recently host to a debate on the issue, “classical music is irrelevant to today's youth.” One side argued that the art form isn't interactive or diverse; the other said it could spark a deep emotional response.

Although I work in the non-visual medium of radio, by training I'm a visual artist. I graduated from art school, and worked for ten years as a graphic designer and illustrator before moving to radio via my lifelong love of music. I think that radio actually is a visual medium, it's just that the associated images are conjured in the imagination of the listener, rather than on paper or on canvas.

Symphony and opera conductor Sir Charles Mackerras died on Wednesday of cancer at 84 years old. Anne Midgette, Classical Music Critic for The Washington Post, reflects on Mackerras's life and greatest achievements.

I have a few musical guilty-pleasures--the accordion, the musical saw and certain kinds of close harmony singing among them. But I’m sure the one that most marks me as, shall we say, a bit odd, is--I’m hesitating to say it, actually--the theater pipe organ.

Lots of composers put the sounds of Nature into their compositions.  Think of Antonio Vivaldi's Four Seasons, or Ludwig van Beethoven's Sixth Symphony. In the 20th century, composers started putting outdoor sounds of a different nature into their work. György Ligeti's opera Le Grand Macabre (which the New York Philharmonic performed so brilliantly last week--you can hear the broadcast June 10 on WQXR), features not one, but two “Car Horn Preludes.” They're scored for twelve bulbed horns (like the kind on a bicycle), each one tuned to a specific pitch. Some of the Ligeti horns were so big and heavy that the percussionists had to stomp on them to play them!

Among the advice proffered when I was pregnant with my son was the thought that playing Mozart (and placing headphones on my planet-sized belly! ) would help my unborn baby’s brain development.

Yo-Yo Ma, Renée Fleming and Sharon Isbin were a few of this year's Grammy Award winners.

Do symphonies need a new business model? Andrew Manshel, WSJ writer and attorney, weighs in.