This afternoon, we’ll remember Sir Neville Marriner, who died yesterday, peacefully, in his sleep, at the age of 92. Impressively, Marriner conducted his final concert in Padua on Thursday. Tomorrow, he was scheduled to begin a tour of Austria, Germany and Belgium with the Academy of St. Martin-in-the-Fields, the orchestra he founded in 1958. We’ll honor this indefatigable musician with a number of his cherished recordings, as well as one or two which are perhaps not so well known.

We’ll also look to American composer Steve Reich, who is 80 years-old today. We’ll hear his Pulitzer Prize winning “Double Sextet,” performed by Eighth Blackbird. If you’re a Steve Reich fan, you’ll want to join David Osenberg for another “Celebrating Our Musical Community,” tonight at 8:00 EDT. He’ll introduce a concert of Reich’s works presented by gifted students and artists-in-residence at the Curtis Institute of Music in Philadelphia, including members of Eighth Blackbird and Nexus Percussion.

Finally, we’ll include some music in observance of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, including a work for string quartet by Darius Milhaud, based on tunes from High Holy Days liturgies indigenous to the composer’s native Provence.

That’s a lot to cover in only three hours. We’ll do our best to make the New Year sweet, from 4 to 7 p.m. EDT, on WWFM – The Classical Network and at wwfm.org.