Brian Lehrer: Brian Lehrer on WNYC, and we continue now with our pledge drive series on great art and culture coming up this summer. It's our summer arts and culture preview series to end the show every day during the drive. Another way, we try to have a little fun if we're having to do this membership drive. Today's focus is classical music and opera.

And we're joined by none other than Ed Yim, Chief Content Officer and Senior Vice President at our sister station, WQXR, home to amazing classical music programming 24/7/365. Hey, Ed, welcome to the show.

Ed Yim: Hey, Brian. Good to be here.

Brian: It's getting a little warmer outside.

Ed: Yes, it's beautiful.

Brian: Today's supposed to be a really nice day and WQXR broadcasts free summer classical concerts I know from the Naumburg Bandshell in Central Park. What can we look forward to there this year?

Ed: Naumburg is such a great series and we are so happy to partner with them every summer. One of the things that I wanted to highlight, just because the piece is so perfect for out-of-doors, is the Knights are playing the Beethoven Pastoral Symphony this season, this summer, along with music by Mozart and Louise Farrenc, who's one of our favorite composers on WQXR.

I think that's going to be lovely, but there's nothing like strolling along the park on a summer evening as the light is just fading, and then hearing this orchestra beckoning you to the Naumburg concert show, it's really great.

Brian: Neat. The New York fill-in Central Park is one I know folks look forward to their park series with a concert in every borough complete with fireworks, that's coming back this year after a hiatus. Am I right about that?

Ed: I think they played last summer. They did have to take a hiatus, obviously, because of COVID and all of those things, but now they are back full force. The soloist for four out of the five boroughs is this fantastic violinist named Randall Goosby, who's been on WQXR before. He is a student of Itzhak Perlman's. He is a lovely person and a lovely violinist.

They are not only playing in Central Park between June 11th and 14th, but they're also playing at Prospect Park in Brooklyn, Van Cortlandt Park in the Bronx, and Cunningham Park in Queens. There's a chamber music concert at Snug Harbor, which is really a nice venue in Staten Island.

Brian: Yes, neat. I see that's all in one week, so there'll be on tour through the five boroughs week of June 11th. I see it's the 11th in Van Cortlandt Park, the 12th in Central Park, the 13th in Cunningham Park, the 14th in Prospect Park, and then the 16th at St. George Theater on Staten Island, so they hit the five boroughs in six nights.

Ed: Yes. A a rite of summer in New York, I think. As much as the glorious music, I love walking around and seeing what everyone's brought for their picnic. That's really fun.

Brian: Yes. I've gotten to do these. Actually, I guess I've done three of them. I've done Central Park, I've done Cunningham, and I've done Van Cortlandt. Great open space at Van Cortlandt Park for anybody who wants to take the one train up here, not far from me. Well, bring your own lawn chair, though, right? Or blanket.

Ed: Yes.

Brian: They're also offering a free Memorial Day concert, I see, at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. That might be one of their current music director's final concerts.

Ed: Yes, that's right. Before the Philharmonic takes off for, I think, the Asia tour, and they also are going back to Vail, Colorado this summer. They'll have this free annual Memorial Day concert at St. John the Divine. It's a beautiful place to hear a concert. I would advise from experience go and line up early. The concert starts at 7:00 PM on May 27th, but I think that the line starts around 5:30 or so.

If you want to hear a little Copeland, quiet City, and some Wagner and some Brahms in the splendor of St. John the Divine with the Philharmonic, and one of Jaap van Zweden's last concerts as music director, make a day of it. Pack a sandwich, and go stand in line.

Brian: We talked about some of the dance performances coming up as part of Lincoln Center's summer for the City Festival on one of our shows last week, but classical music and opera play a big part in their programming too, right? What are some of the highlights?

Ed: Summer for the City has turned into such a rich tapestry of all sorts of things. There are outdoor films and comedy and Jazz. I think this summer they're doing an India week, dance parties, but from the classical music perspective, the thing that I'm really excited about is they're new. Festival Orchestra of Lincoln Center's music director, Jonathon Heyward is going to be doing concerts on July 23rd and 24th.

The theme of summer in the City, I read, is life, liberty, and happiness, which we could all use a little bit of these days. The wonderful thing about Summer for the City is that I believe all of their events are either free or pay what you choose. If you can afford the suggested ticket price, great, support your musical organization, but if you can't, they want you to have access as well.

Brian: Sounds like WNYC and WQXR.

Ed: Yes, exactly. Yes, it's very publicly minded. We applaud that. Then, later in the summer, usually in August, they haven't announced the schedule yet, but I love when the Metropolitan Opera puts up a big movie screen on the plaza and they replay some of the HD broadcasts from the previous season.

It's like going to Opera drive-in, and you can bring your wine and your popcorn and watch Madama Butterfly, or The Hours or Fire Shut Up in My Bones, or whatever they choose to show this summer.

Brian: In our last 30 seconds, not to be excluded. Carnegie Hall has a citywide festival already underway with free concerts at different venues, right?

Ed: They do. The one that caught my eye is that our friends, the Harlem Chamber Players with Tania Leon are doing a concert on July 5th in Bryant Park, and there's something almost every week between June 1st and August 2nd, but just in the little time that we have left, I just want to let people know that in the first week of August, Carnegie Hall is convening at the hall international youth orchestras from all over the world.

The National Youth Orchestra of the United States, the Beijing Youth Orchestra, an Afghan Youth Orchestra, African Youth Orchestra, it's going to be amazing with these kids from all over the world playing orchestral music at Carnegie.

Brian: All right, Ed Yim. Back down the hall with you to your day job as Chief Content Officer and Senior Vice President at our sister station, classical WQXR. Thanks for doing this with us.

Ed: Thanks for having me, Brian.

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