James Bennett II

This week: James Bennett on compulsive crying, girl choirs, and Haiti's musical legacy. 

On the joys of some possibly inauthentic yet captivating Balkan melodies, occasions when the best part of the song is the whole song and the intolerable nature of bad aux cord Dj-ing.

Going to sleep with a mind laden with existential thoughts isn't all bad... right?

This week: anxiety, despair and flirtations with a hope most coquettish. 

James Bennett muses on a very Black Nativity scene.

The recent rediscovery of Price's work should inspire us to work harder to find new music, not rest because we've got our diversity play.

This week: James Bennett on what makes a "good" album. And also harpsichords.

This week: The blustery cool of Mingus’s 'All the Things You Can C♯', and why winter is the best season.

This week: James Bennett on Florence Price’s Fantasie Nègre, mac and cheese, and sharing your musical discoveries.

Don't exit this window! Just hear me out! 

Black History Month — or any other commemorative month — should be a time to experiment with new programming that can become a fixture all year long.

Advent hymns are Good, and it's weird we don't listen to more of them.

Listen, it's called an "opinion" for a reason.

WQXR is testing a new streaming platform in response to the changing terrain of digital music listening experiences.

The 94-year old nonprofit institution will close in January of next year.

During the Civil War, piano battles played by women in the parlor served as a connection to violence on the front.

To paraphrase musicologist Doug Shadle, "the classical music industry trades in the anecdote." What does that actually look like, and what are the consequences?

It’s no secret: Richard Wagner was not particularly fond of non-white, non-Aryan peoples. So how do we square that with his artistic legacy?

Scott Joplin wrote his opera Treemonisha in 1910, but it didn't get a premiere until six decades later. Its production is an example of how to move outside of the canon.

Why do film and TV villains love classical music so much?