WRTI Spotlight

What is the Corporation for Public Broadcasting? (CPB)

What is National Public Radio? (NPR)

How are they related to WRTI?

Are you under the impression that CPB and NPR are synonymous? They're not. Do you think that WRTI and other local public radio stations receive their funding from NPR? They don't. Many people find all of this confusing...especially in light of the attention public radio funding has been receiving in the media during the last few months. No worries. We're here to connect the dots.

Some of the best jazz musicians in the world are about to descend on Reading, Pennsylvania from Friday, March 25 through Sunday, April 3. You'll be there, too, with WRTI.

Throughout the Berks Jazz Fest, tune in during our evening jazz shows as bassist Gerald Veasley phones in to Bob Perkins and Maureen Malloy to update us about the festival's bands and venues.

The Grammy Awards were handed out in February, and a few surprises in the pop categories might interest you. And do you know who won the classical and jazz awards? We're here to fill you in. Some are newcomers - some are tried and true.

Tuesday, March 8

6 pm to midnight


In honor of Mardi Gras, WRTI presents music from the Crescent City's finest. Join Bob Perkins and Maureen Malloy as they bring the Fat Tuesday party to Philly!


Listen for quintessential New Orleans jazz from originators such as Louis Armstrong and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band, plus those they've influenced from today's scene including Nicholas Payton and Jeremy Davenport.


So gather your krewe, grab some po'boys, and together we'll party all night long!

Ferruccio Busoni. He was the first to perform all 18 Franz Liszt Preludes together, the first to play all 24 Chopin Preludes together, and, over four nights in Berlin, he soloed in 14 concertos with orchestra. Fourteen. They couldn't invent words big enough to describe this new star among pianists. Not only did they call him star, but also sun, giant, and king - tripping over themselves to find superlatives.

Works for Organ and Orchestra by Charles-Marie Widor and Aaron Copland

The organ world in Paris - in January of 1870 - was buzzing when the top names in the business saw to it that a 25-year-old got the biggest job in the city. St. Sulpice Church was looking for someone to pilot its newly installed five-manual organ, the greatest and largest instrument by Aristide Cavaille-Coll, known as the greatest organ builder of the 19th century.

Camille Saint-Saens, Charles Gounod, and Cavaille-Coll himself all said that there was only one person for the job: Charles-Marie Widor. The church offered Widor the appointment on a temporary basis. He kept the job for 64 years.

The WRTI Winter Drive was a Success!


We raised $265,347 because of the commitment of 2,593 new and renewing members who invested in classical music and jazz on WRTI. It's not too late to contribute. Click Here to pledge.

From Deceptive Cadence - NPR's new classical music blog. Bob McQuiston writes about Dmitri Shostakovich's influence on the Polish-born composer Mieczyslaw Weinberg. Three of Weinberg's string quartets are performed on the young Danelo Quartet's latest album.

Polish-born composer Mieczyslaw Weinberg (also spelled Vaynberg) was of Jewish decent, and the only immediate member of his family to get out of Poland alive, following the Nazi occupation of 1939. Initially he fled to Minsk, but as the Nazis "panzered" into Russia, he moved further east to Tashkent in 1941.