Best Our Common Nature With Yo Yo Ma Podcasts (2025)

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Introducing Our Common Nature with Yo-Yo Ma 43:57

Play Pause

7d ago43:57

43:57

Ana González is here to introduce you to her new podcast, Our Common Nature, a musical journey with cellist Yo-Yo Ma. When the world stopped in 2020, Yo-Yo Ma started thinking about how music can reconnect people to the natural world. In this limited podcast series, Yo-Yo goes around the country to places where people have deep connections to the e…

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The Smokies: Mountains and Forgotten Family with Yo-Yo Ma 42:52

28d ago42:52

42:52

In the Smoky Mountains, traditions layer and intersect. Yo-Yo Ma believes that story and song can help us grapple with America’s complicated history. This episode highlights two stories of people who are reclaiming their connections to the land. The first brings us to Cherokee, North Carolina, where Lavita Hill and Mary Crowe are working to change …

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Hawai‘i: Yo-Yo Ma and the Whales 43:46

5h ago43:46

43:46

Yo-Yo Ma has wanted to use his cello to communicate with whales for half his life. And, in Hawai’i, he got a chance. With help from the Polyneisan Voyaging Society and hula master Snowbird Bento, Yo-Yo learns about the ancient art of Hawaiian chant, what one local singer describes to him as their “contribution to the orchestra of the world.” Then A…

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Introducing Our Common Nature with Yo-Yo Ma 33:01

7d ago33:01

33:01

Ana González is here to introduce you to her new podcast, Our Common Nature, a musical journey with cellist Yo-Yo Ma. When the world stopped in 2020, Yo-Yo Ma started thinking about how music can reconnect people to the natural world. In this limited podcast series, Yo-Yo goes around the country to places where people have deep connections to the e…

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Hawai‘i: Yo-Yo Ma on Moloka‘i 44:33

7d ago44:33

44:33

On the island of Molokaʻi in Hawaii, we trace the spiritual power of mana, from a sacred grove to the Kalaupapa colony, where music, story, and Yo-Yo Ma’s performance honor the resilience and memory of those who came before. Perched on a plateau on the southeast side of the island of Molokaʻi sits a grove of kukui trees. Mikiʻala Pescaia tells us t…

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West Virginia: Yo-Yo Ma and West Virginia Coal 45:35

14d ago45:35

45:35

West Virginia is defined by its beauty and its coal, two things that can work against each other. Yo-Yo Ma felt this as soon as stepped foot in its hills.This episode explores how music and poetry help process the emotions of a community besieged with disaster and held together by pride and duty. We travel down the Coal River with third-generation …

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Alaska: Yo-Yo Ma and the Gwich’in play for the salmon 44:06

21d ago44:06

44:06

This episode begins in Fairbanks, AK. Yo-Yo Ma is at a house concert with drag queen environmentalist Pattie Gonia, singer/songwriter Quinn Christopherson and Princess Daazhraii Johnson, a writer and filmmaker from the Gwich’in Nation. They were all performing to help their communities process the negative effects of climate change in Alaska. Salmo…

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Kentucky: Yo-Yo Ma and the Louisville Orchestra perform in Mammoth Cave 33:45

1M ago33:45

33:45

A cave can hold secrets. Louisville Orchestra conductor Teddy Abrams knows that, which is why he wrote a piece for symphony orchestra to be performed entirely underground. This episode takes us into Mammoth Cave to hear a performance that unlocks a centuries of stories preserved by the caves' seemingly endless walls. One of those is the story of Je…

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Acadia: Yo-Yo Ma and the Wabanaki Play for the Dawn 32:04

1M ago32:04

32:04

The series opens with a window into the Yo-Yo universe, one where music and nature work together. Host Ana González guides us into Yo-Yo Ma’s mindset, connecting Bach to leaves, birds, and sunlight. That takes us to a sunrise in Acadia National Park in Maine, where Chris Newell leads Yo-Yo and Wabanaki musicians in a musical performance to welcome …

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Our Common Nature with Yo-Yo Ma: Coming Soon! 1:54

2M ago1:54

1:54

When the world stopped in 2020, cellist Yo-Yo Ma started thinking about how music can reconnect people to nature. In this limited podcast series, Yo-Yo travels around the country to make music and meet people who have deep connections to the earth. Host Ana González joins him to uncover stories of the ways that culture binds us to nature, from Main…

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Janna Levin on Mozart’s Unfinished Ambitions 24:36

1+ y ago24:36

24:36

Janna Levin is a theoretical cosmologist and professor of astronomy and physics at Barnard College in New York City, specializing in the study of black holes. A Guggenheim Fellow, she’s authored several books on the topics of space, mathematics, and the impassioned people that study them; her latest book, “Black Hole Survival Guide,” allows readers…

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Hanna Arie-Gaifman on Bach and Survival 15:52

1+ y ago15:52

15:52

Hanna Arie-Gaifman served as the director of the Tisch Center for the Arts at the 92nd Street Y for over 20 years, where she produced countless multidisciplinary projects, cementing 92NY’s place as a leading literary and performance art venue in New York City. Before then, Aire-Gaifman worked around the world as an arts administrator, linguist, and…

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Caroline Shaw on Mendelssohn and Possibility 11:49

1+ y ago11:49

11:49

Caroline Shaw is a tireless musician, active as a violinist, vocalist, producer, and composer. She’s won multiple Grammy awards and, along with Kendrick Lamar, is one of the youngest recipients of the Pulitzer Prize in Music. Throughout her career, she has continuously experimented across genres, her collaborations spanning from the likes of Nas an…

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Nick Ferrone on Why Barber’s “Adagio” Gets a Bad Rap 24:41

1+ y ago24:41

24:41

By day, Nick Ferrone is a Brooklyn real estate agent, but on most Saturday nights, he can be found playing the harmonica at Sunny’s Bar in Red Hook. As the seventh of eight kids, Ferrone reaped the benefits of being exposed to records that most kids his age weren’t listening to, including the one that inspired him to start playing the harmonica: “G…

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Lucy Boynton on Chopin and Getting Into Character 13:44

1+ y ago13:44

13:44

You might know actress Lucy Boynton from the television mini-series “The Ipcress File” and films like “Chevalier” and “Murder on the Orient Express.” She grew up with a music-loving family who always had something playing in the background. Here, Boynton shares a favorite piano piece by Chopin and reflects on the power of music to establish tone in…

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Martha Lane Fox on Perseverance and Beethoven 17:52

1+ y ago17:52

17:52

If anyone can claim the title of Renaissance Woman, it is Martha Lane Fox. Though she gained prominence during the dot-com boom of the 1990s, her career has since led her serve as the Chancellor of Open University in the United Kingdom; to sit on the boards of companies likeChanel, WeTransfer, and Twitter; and, in 2013, she became the youngest fema…

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Steve Reich on Why Medieval Music Sounds So Fresh 25:31

1+ y ago25:31

25:31

Steve Reich is one of the most important composers of the 20th and 21st centuries. A leader in developing and popularizing what many describe as minimalist music — but which Reich has often preferred to describe as music that unfolds over a gradual process — his music helped reassert the value of tonality and sonority within newly composed concert …

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Anne-Sophie Mutter on Why Bach Is Always the Answer 12:32

1+ y ago12:32

12:32

“Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” is one of Bach’s best known works. For acclaimed violinist Anne-Sophie Mutter, it has been part of her life since she was a child and has accompanied her through some of her life’s most important moments. As she puts it, “Bach is always the answer — for the joyous moments in life as much as for the moments where you do…

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Víkingur Ólafsson on the Unpredictable Futurism of Rameau 16:21

1+ y ago16:21

16:21

All classical musicians are devoted to the art of reinterpretation — of trying to make the old feel new again. Pianist Víkingur Ólafsson actually manages to pull it off. Whether he’s performing keyboard music hundreds of years old or a piece hot off the press, one has the feeling that they’ve never heard this music before, or this music played in t…

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Garth Greenwell on Finding Refuge in the Music of Britten and Pears 19:35

1+ y ago19:35

19:35

By now, Garth Greenwell is an award-winning author, poet, literary critic, and teacher of writing whose novels include “What Belongs To You” and “Cleanness.” But his first creative aspiration was as a musician: He attended the Interlochen Academy for the Arts and, later, the Eastman School of Music, focusing on vocal performance. In this episode, G…

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Jennifer Egan on Chopin's Narrative Masterclass 21:44

1+ y ago21:44

21:44

Jennifer Egan has spent a lifetime thinking about what makes a good story — to good effect. Her novels have received many awards and recognitions, including the Pulitzer Prize for “A Visit From the Good Squad.” Its companion book and her latest work, “The Candy House,” was named one of The New York Times’s 10 Best Books of 2022. They say that one o…

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Rowan Williams on Bach and the Daily Discipline of Silence 13:05

1+ y ago13:05

13:05

Rowan Williams is a British theologian and poet. From 2003-2012, he served as the Archbishop of Canterbury — a role that placed him, along with the British monarch, at the head of the Anglican Church. As one of today’s most influential religious leaders, Williams has often been the subject of both praise and controversy for his outspoken views, inc…

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Dexter Filkins on Tension, Tenderness, and Ravel 21:03

1+ y ago21:03

21:03

Dexter Filkins is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, former Iraq War correspondent for the New York Times, and author of the bestselling book, “The Forever War.” He’s currently a staff writer for The New Yorker. In this episode, Filkins recalls how Ravel’s music gave him respite during his “nightmare years” covering the war in Iraq. He explains h…

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Marin Alsop on Beethoven and Humanity’s Infinite Potential 25:34

1+ y ago25:34

25:34

As one of the leading conductors of our time, Marin Alsop has collected a lot of “firsts”: She’s the first woman to head a major orchestra in the United States, South America, Austria and the United Kingdom. Throughout her career, she has also tirelessly advocated for equitable music education and for professional opportunities for other female con…

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Nathalie Joachim on the Connection Between Brahms and Haiti 20:44

1+ y ago20:44

20:44

Nathalie Joachim is a Grammy-nominated flutist, vocalist and composer. She is the co-founder of the acclaimed flute-meets-electronica duo Flutronix, as well as the composer of the evening-length work “Fanm d’Ayiti,” which explores her heritage and, more broadly, women’s voices in Haiti. Her recently-released album “Ki moun ou ye” (“Which person are…

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Elizabeth Day on Jacqueline du Pré’s Elgar and Navigating Loss 11:07

1+ y ago11:07

11:07

Elizabeth Day is an author, broadcaster, and host of the podcast “How to Fail,” where she interviews guests about what they have learned from failure. In this episode, Day reflects on a performance that has guided her through different stages of her life: Jacqueline Du Pré’s rendition of Elgar’s Cello Concerto in E Minor. From the disappointment of…

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Damien Sneed on Dreams, Family and Franz Liszt 25:23

1+ y ago25:23

25:23

Damien Sneed is an award-winning musician, conductor, composer and arts educator who works across classical, jazz, R&B and other genres. When he was five years old, Sneed’s parents told him he was adopted. He walks us through the story of how, through a series of dreams and coincidences, he eventually reunited with his biological family and learned…

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Deborah Frances-White on Chance Encounters and Mozart 12:25

1+ y ago12:25

12:25

Deborah Frances-White is a comedian, writer, and host of “The Guilty Feminist” podcast, where she explores the balancing act between feminist idealism and human imperfection. In this episode, White reflects on her upbringing as a Jehovah’s Witness and shares a story about the first time she saw a performance of Mozart’s opera “Così fan tutte.” On t…

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Tom Hiddleston on Arvo Pärt and the Infinite 19:54

2y ago19:54

19:54

Tom Hiddleston is an actor beloved around the world for his roles in film, television, and the stage, most notably for his portrayal of the Norse god Loki in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Before all that, he was a student at the Royal Academy of Arts in London, balancing both high hopes and uncertainty for his future. For the debut episode of the …

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The Open Ears Project Returns! 1:51

2y ago1:51

1:51

The Open Ears Project returns for a new season on February 12! From tales of memorable moments in nature and fleeting encounters with strangers – to recollections of music that helped in difficult times – The Open Ears Project features people sharing a personal story about the classical track that means the most to them, and why. This season’s gues…

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Love and Other Drugs: Gounod's Roméo et Juliette 54:14

2y ago54:14

54:14

Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet” is the most famous love story in the Western canon. It’s a tale so embedded in our culture — one that has seen so many iterations and retellings — it might feel hard to appreciate its original pathos, and the way it perfectly distills the intersections of young romance, idealism, and rebellion. In this episode, host…

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You Don't Own Me: The Myth and Magic of Bizet's Carmen 53:47

2y ago53:47

53:47

Carmen is maybe the most famous heroine in all of opera. She’s a woman of Romani descent living in 19th century Spain, sensual and self-confident, aware of the power she wields over men — and she enjoys it. In her signature aria, popularly known as the “Habanera,” she describes herself as a bird who can’t be captured. True to her own word, Carmen —…

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Revisiting Mozart’s Queen of the Night: Outrage Out of This World 27:11

2y ago27:11

27:11

When the Voyager spacecraft set off to explore the galaxy in 1977, it carried a recording to represent the best of humanity. The “Golden Record” featured everyone from Bach to Chuck Berry, but there was only one opera aria: the rage-fest and coloratura masterpiece from Mozart’s “The Magic Flute.” As Kathryn Lewek reprises her role as Queen of the N…

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Love Takes Flight: Catán's Florencia en el Amazonas 52:54

2y ago52:54

52:54

It’s the early 1900s, and the steamship El Dorado makes its way along the Amazon River towards Manaus, a city in the heart of the Brazilian rainforest. Onboard is the world-famous opera singer Florencia Grimaldi. She’s got a gig at the opera house in Manaus, but that’s just a cover. She’s actually hoping for a reunion with her long-lost love, the b…

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Davis’s X: The Life and Legacy of Malcolm X 45:50

2y ago45:50

45:50

Malcolm X led many lives within his 39 years: as a bereaved but precocious child; as an imprisoned convict; as a firebrand spokesperson for the Nation of Islam and Black nationalism; and ultimately as one of the most pivotal figures of the Civil Rights movement. Today, he continues to inspire passion and controversy, his legacy as nuanced as the ma…

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Revisiting Gluck’s Orfeo ed Euridice: Don’t Look Back in Ardor 32:55

2y ago32:55

32:55

If a loved one were to die, how far would you be willing to go to bring them back? Orpheus, the ancient Greek musician, goes to hell and back to have the love of his life, Eurydice, by his side again. The gods cut a deal with Orpheus: he can bring his love back from hell, but all throughout the journey, she has to follow behind him and he is not al…

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Good Things Come to Those Who Weep: Donizetti’s L’Elisir d’Amore 42:09

2y ago42:09

42:09

“L’Elisir d’Amore” — “The Elixir of Love” — is what’s known as an opera buffa, or comic opera. That means that we’re in for a happy ending. But Donizetti knows that the payoff is only earned through the suffering of his protagonists. In one pivotal moment, our hero Nemorino glimpses his beloved shedding a single tear — and he concludes (crazily, bu…

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Death, Faith, and Redemption: Heggie’s Dead Man Walking 44:58

2y ago44:58

44:58

What does redemption mean to a man sentenced to death? Is capital punishment justice or vengeance? Could anyone ever forgive a murderer? These are just some of the questions behind the true story of the nun who became a spiritual adviser to men on death row at the Louisiana State Penitentiary. Dead Man Walking was first a 1993 memoir by the Catholi…

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Aria Code Returns for Season 4! 2:00

2y ago2:00

2:00

At last! After much anticipation, Aria Code returns! We’re guiding listeners through highlights from the Metropolitan Opera’s 2023-2024 season, pairing beloved classics with investigations into modern masterpieces. So get ready for a night at the opera — from the comfort of your own home. (Or wherever!) Arias from the likes of Jake Heggie’s Dead Ma…

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P.S. I Love You: Renée Fleming Sings Tchaikovsky's Eugene Onegin 51:13

4y ago51:13

51:13

Saying “I love you” for the first time takes courage, especially when you don’t know the response you'll get. But being open with your emotions and putting yourself out there can change you in unexpected ways. In Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky’s Eugene Onegin, it’s the 16-year-old Tatyana who pins her heart on her sleeve. Young and naive, but also fierce…