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Enjoy masterful and (in one case) quirky variations on music composers wrote earlier in their careers and then used in variations. Hear contrasting works by Norman Dello Joio and Franz Schmidt. Don’t be surprised if you hear echoes of tunes you've heard before!

Beethoven recycled! In this case, he used incidental music composed for “The Ruins of Athens” and adapted it for the reopening of the Josephstadt Theater in Vienna. The new and improved music was “The Consecration of the House” and if you’ve only heard the overture, there’s a lot more fine music to enjoy.

Music of the Baroque period remains perhaps the most popular among classical music lovers. Today we have delights by Georg Phillip Telemann, George Frideric Handel, and a name you might not know yet – Thomas Augustine Arne. We’ll hear why this music remains so compelling.

The great Czech composer Antonín Dvořák redefined music of his native land and shared its indigenous rhythms and colors with the world. We’ll hear two contrasting works – his buoyant Serenade for Winds Op. 44 in a spectacular live recording, and his melodramatic tone poem “The Golden Spinning Wheel” based on a folk tale that must be heard to be believed.

In what remains one of the most significant examples of variations in music, Italian Renaissance composer Costanzo Festa created 125 variations on a 15th century melody. We’ll hear 32 of those in a stunning recording of what’s been called one of the most remarkable accomplishments in music.

Listen to symphonies by Morton Gould and Hector Berlioz that were composed for concert band. In craftsmanship and sonority, they make a compelling case for what can be achieved with winds, brass and percussion.

Surprise symphonies are those that might have escaped you over the years, but which definitely deserve to be heard. This week we have an excellent symphony by 14 year-old Felix Mendelssohn and the most popular symphony by Karl Goldmark, one that was praised by his close friend Johannes Brahms.

We have two very different symphonies this week: an Italian gem from 1800 by cello prodigy Luigi Boccherini and a powerful 21st century portrait by American composer Jonathan Leshnoff of the chaos and homesickness of American soldiers in World War I. Leshnoff’s Symphony No. 3 incorporates texts from solders’ letters to tell the story of the great war’s impact on their lives.

Although Tchaikovsky's output was prolific, he wrote little chamber music. Enjoy his only piano trio: the masterful Piano Trio in A minor which he wrote in memory of his friend and mentor Nikolai Rubenstein. We’ll also hear his very first composition for violin and orchestra played by a student of the man to whom Tchaikovsky dedicated it.

Charles Ives was an American composer whose music we’re still learning to understand. We’ll hear two world premiere recordings that show distinctly different sides of his compositional output.