Today is the feast day of St. Nicholas!
The gruff-but-lovable bishop, who bears little resemblance to his jolly, elfin descendant, is the patron saint of just about everyone, but most especially children.
We’ll honor him with music performed by treble choristers of King’s College, Cambridge, under the direction of the late Stephen Cleobury, and a selection from the Anonymous 4 album, “Legends of St. Nicholas.”
We’ll also celebrate the birthday today of another Nicholas – Nikolaus Harnoncourt – who would have been 90. Harnoncourt will conduct one of the orchestral suites of Georg Philipp Telemann. In addition, we’ll light some candles and share some cake with composers John Fernstrom, Henryk Gorecki, Joseph Lamb, Alexander Moyzes, Bright Sheng, Tomas Svoboda, and Orazio Vecchi.
At 6:00, we’ll recollect the wonders of childhood, with music from cinematic fairy tales, on “Picture Perfect,” including “The Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm” (Leigh Harline), “The Company of Wolves” (George Fenton), “Puss in Boots” (Henry Jackman), and “La Belle et La Bête” (Georges Auric).
Hopefully, St. Nicholas will be on his best behavior. Even when he punches out heretics, he always means well.
Join me, in the nick of time, from 4 to 7 p.m. EST, on WWFM – The Classical Network and wwfm.org.

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