Tom Huizenga
Tom Huizenga is a producer for NPR Music. He contributes a wide range of stories about classical music to NPR's news programs and is the classical music reviewer for All Things Considered. He appears regularly on NPR Music podcasts and founded NPR's classical music blog Deceptive Cadence in 2010.
Joining NPR in 1999, Huizenga produced, wrote and edited NPR's Peabody Award-winning daily classical music show Performance Today and the programs SymphonyCast and World of Opera.
He's produced live radio broadcasts from the Kennedy Center and other venues, including New York's (Le) Poisson Rouge, where he created NPR's first classical music webcast featuring the Emerson String Quartet.
As a video producer, Huizenga has created some of NPR Music's noteworthy music documentaries in New York. He brought mezzo-soprano Joyce DiDonato to the historic Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village, placed tenor Lawrence Brownlee and pianist Jason Moran inside an active crypt at a historic church in Harlem, and invited composer Philip Glass to a Chinatown loft to discuss music with Devonté Hynes (aka Blood Orange).
He has also written and produced radio specials, such as A Choral Christmas With Stile Antico, broadcast on stations around the country.
Prior to NPR, Huizenga served as music director for NPR member station KRWG, in Las Cruces, New Mexico, and taught in the journalism department at New Mexico State University.
Born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, Huizenga's radio career began at the University of Michigan, where he produced and hosted a broad range of radio programs at Ann Arbor's WCBN-FM. He holds a B.A. from the University of Michigan in English literature and ethnomusicology.
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Antonin Dvorak's "New World Symphony" is an anthem to American roots. It was written by a foreigner and required white classical musicians to respect Black spirituals and Native American music.
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The band's sophomore album, Earthdrawn Skies, connects the dots in wildly diverse music spanning eight centuries. -
ÁTTA, the band's first album in 10 years, sports an orchestra of strings, high-flying vocalism and its signature bittersweet melodies. -
Saariaho, who battled a male-dominated educational system in her native Finland, forged a strong and singular voice in contemporary music. -
With a piano draped in spring flowers, Lara Downes plays a smart set of music, new and old, that offers the power of renewal. -
A new collection of recordings finally freed from the vaults offers a chance to hear one of opera's greatest artists sing Wagner, Strauss, Berlioz and more. -
The music that haunts the Oscar-nominated film is a calling card for conductor Rafael Payare. -
On her new album, Dark with Excessive Bright, the vibrant, young composer coaxes unusual sounds from a symphony orchestra. -
The composer of Breaking the Waves speaks candidly about equity in her field, the importance of role models and the unglamorous side of writing music every day. -
Watch the pianist, who's been called "a performer of near-superhuman prowess," play a smart set that spans six centuries.
