WMHT-FM

WMHT-FM: Your 24-Hour Classical Music Source

WMHT-FM provides comprehensive classical music programming, combining original productions, distinctive specialty programs, live concert presentations and the talents of local and nationally-recognized hosts.

On your radio dial at WMHT-FM 89.1 in New York's Capital Region and on WRHV-FM 88.7 in the Poughkeepsie area (and also available via HD radio), our station helps keep the arts thriving in our community by making wonderful classical music accessible to all.

WMHT and WRHV bring you renowned programs such as 'Bach's Lunch,' 'Performance Today,' 'SymphonyCast' and 'WMHT Live!' while also keeping you abreast of current events with NPR News updates.

You can also listen to your favorite classical music online, thanks to the support of our generous members. Or, if you're on the go, you can listen to your classical companion on your iPhone, iPad, iPod Touch or Android via the WMHT-FM apps.

To your right, you'll find some of the faces that deliver the classical music you won't find anywhere else in the area.

Be sure to check out our RISE radio reading service as well to learn about other ways in which WMHT public radio serves our community.

Don't forget to delve into WMHT's podcasts, and if you ever wonder what you just heard on your classical connection, please make use of our playlist search feature.

WMHT-FM can only exist with the continued and dedicated support of listeners like you. Please make a contribution so that we can keep classical music alive on your radio dial. Do you have a question about WMHT-FM? If so, just ask.

• Click here for a printable weekly WMHT-FM schedule grid.

Also, if you love classical music, you may also wish to connect with us and other WMHT-FM fans on our Facebook page.

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Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) Welcome to 'Composer’s Classroom,' an on-air/online/in-classroom partnership between WMHT-FM and the Mohonasen Central School District! You can hear Bill Winans on this month's composer just after the 7 a.m. news on Friday mornings on WMHT-FM.

WMHT's 'Composer of the Month' for May is Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750) was a German composer, organist, harpsichordist, violist, and violinist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity.

At the age of 14, Bach was awarded a choral scholarship to study at the prestigious St. Michael's School in Lüneburg. In his two years there, he was exposed to a wider facet of European culture. In addition to singing in the choir he played the School's three-manual organ and harpsichords.

After graduating from St. Michael’s, he was appointed court musician in Weimar where his reputation as a keyboardist spread so much that he was widely invited to give organ recitals. Three years later, he took a better paying position in Muhlhausen where he met and married his second cousin, Maria Barbara who bore him seven children, four of whom survived to adulthood, including Wilhelm Friedemann Bach and Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, both of whom went on to their own fame.

Bach relocated to nearby Weimar a few years later in 1708 for a position as organist and concertmaster in the Weimar court. This began a sustained period of composing keyboard and orchestral works including the beginnings of what would become The Well-Tempered Clavier as well as his first Christmas Cantata.

In his early twenties, Bach was invited by Prince Leopold of Kothen to be his Kapellmeister (Director of Music). His works from this period include the Orchestral Suites, The Brandenburg Concertos and his six unaccompanied Cello Suites.

Bach’s wife passed away suddenly in 1720. The following year, he met and married his second wife Anna Magdalena, 17 years his junior. Together they had thirteen more children, six of whom survived into adulthood, including Johann Christoph Friedrich and Johann Christian who would go on to achieve their own musical fame.

For more on Bach, click on the links below. Check back May 24 for more on our Composer of the Month.

• Learn more about Bach on wikipedia.org

• Visit jsbach.org

• Learn more about Bach on BaroquMusic.org

*Teachers: For related composer and classical music resources visit PBS Learning Media.*

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