If you missed Coachella this year, I think it's safe to say it kicked off what will be a very interesting and exciting Summer Festival season. And this weekend's post will be starting up with concerts going on, hopefully until the end of Summer.

First up is Arctic Monkeys from the first weekend (April 13th) and one of their typically high-voltage sets.

Here's what you'll be hearing:

1. Brianstorm
2.This House Is a Circus
3.Still Take You Home
4. Don't Sit Down 'Cause I've Moved Your Chair
5.The View From the Afternoon
6.I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor
7.Pretty Visitors
8.Evil Twin
9.Brick by Brick
10.Teddy Picker
11.Crying Lightning
12.Fluorescent Adolescent
13.R U Mine?

Turn it up, kick back and relax. Try and hit a festival this year if you can, there's a lot of them. Nothing beats live music anywhere, anyhow. But since you can't be everywhere, we'll fill you in on what you're missing.

Fair 'nuff?

In case you missed the fundraiser earlier and still want to contribute to keep the archive and Newstalgia up and running. Anything is appreciated and its gratefully received.

A celebration from Madrid tonight. In honor of the 75th anniversary of the founding of Radio Nacional Espana, the Orquesta Sinfonica de RTVE (Spanish Radio and Television) put on a special commemorative concert in which no less than Queen Sofia of Spain attended.

The concert was recorded live-as-it-happened on June 1st of this year and features the RTVE Symphony conducted by Garcia Asensio and Luis Fernando Pèrèz, piano in music of San Miguel, de Falla and Borodin.

Here's what they play:

Orquesta Sinfónica y Coro de RTVE

Concierto 75 aniversario de R.N.E. Transmisión directa desde el Teatro Monumental de Madrid.

Part 1:
1.SAN MIGUEL: Fantasía radiante (estreno y encargo de RNE).

2.FALLA: Noches en los jardines de España. L. F. Pérez (p.).

Part 2 -
BORODIN: Sinfonía nº 2 en Si menor.

Orq. Sinf. de RTVE. Dir.: E. García Asensio.

Since it's Anti-Road Rage Wednesday, you can certainly join in the celebration. Or just get horizontal.

Over to Dorchester-on-Thames this week for a live broadcast of the opening concert from the 2012 English Music Festival in Dorchester, England with the BBC Concert Orchestra in music by Parry, Curtis, Delius, Vaughan-Williams, Ireland and Moeran.

Celebrating their 60 years as a tight-knit little band, The BBC Concert Orchestra, conducted by Martin Yates and featuring Mark Bebbington, play an outstanding program of World Premieres and seldom heard works by British composers, and a couple of work-horses in the mix.

Here the rundown:

Live from Dorchester Abbey, Dorchester-On-Thames
Presented by Catherine Bott

The opening concert from this year's English Music Festival in Dorchester-on-Thames. The BBC Concert Orchestra are joined by pianist Mark Bebbington in John Ireland's Legend and the first performance of an early work by Vaughan Williams, his Piano Fantasia. The concert ends with another premiere: conductor Martin Yates's completion of Moeran's Second Symphony.

Part 1:Parry: Jerusalem
Curtis: Festival Overture
Vaughan Williams: Piano Fantasia (World Premiere)
Part 2:Ireland: Legend
Delius: Over The Hills And Far Away
Moeran: Second Symphony (World Premiere)

Mark Bebbington (piano)
BBC Concert Orchestra
Martin Yates (conductor).

It's Anti-road Rage Wednesday, and this one does the trick.

Enjoy.

Getting back to the Coachella Music & Arts Festival this week. A great concert was enjoyed by all on April 14th when Radiohead took the stage for two amazing hours. Thom York and company proved once again they are one of the truly great bands currently making the rounds. And this Summer looks pretty memorable by all accounts.

Here's the rundown:

Radiohead Set list – Coachella - April 14, 2012

1.Bloom

2.15 Step

3.Weird Fishes/Arpeggi

4.Morning Mr. Magpie

5.Staircase

6.The Gloaming

7.Pyramid Song

8.The Daily Mail

9.Myxomatosis

10.Karma Police

11.Identikit

12.Lotus Flower

13.There There

14.Bodysnatchers

15.Idioteque

# Encore:

16.Lucky

17.Reckoner

18.Everything In Its Right Place Play Video
(With "After The Gold Rush" intro)

Encore 2:

19.Give Up the Ghost

20.Paranoid Android

Since it's the full concert, it's spread out over two players.

Enjoy the rest of the weekend.

Over to Paris this week for a concert by Orchestre de Paris, conducted by Alain Altinoglu and featuring Pianist Romain Descharmes in a program of music by Chabrier, Saint-Saens and Florent Schmitt.

The venerable war-horse Espana by Emmanuel Chabrier opens the concert, followed by a wildly well-received Saint-Saens Piano concerto Number 2, with Pianist Romain Descharmes, who follows with two encores. The concert concludes with the seldom heard (at least here in the U.S.) La Tragèdie de Salomè by the early 20th century composer Florent Schmitt.

A good concert of mostly familiar music done as only a French orchestra can.

The concert is broken up between two players - the Chabrier and the Saint-Saens (and encores) are on the top player and the Schmitt is on the bottom player.

For you note takers:

16 mai 2012
En direct de la Cité de la Musique : Chabrier, Saint-Saëns, Schmitt

Emmanuel Chabrier
España (1883)

Camille Saint-Saëns
Concerto N°2 en sol mineur Op.22 (1868)

Florent Schmitt
La Tragédie de Salomé Op.50 (1907)

Romain Descharmes, Piano
Orchestre de Paris
Alain Altinoglu, Direction
Coproduction Cité de la musique, Orchestre de Paris.

Enjoy.

Continuing the recap of Coachella this year, here is a set by the Spanish-French contingent M83, who suitably blew away the audience and were suitably blown away by the audience.

It's the full 90 minute set, so I broke it up between two players. Here's the song lineup:

01. Intro
02.Teen Angst
03.Reunion
04.Sitting
05.We Own The Sky
06.Steve McQueen
07.Fall (Daft Punk cover)
08.Midnight City
09.Couleurs

More from Coachella next week. Until then, enjoy.

Over to Paris this week for a recital by renowned Russian Pianist Denis Matsuev, recorded live in concert at Thèatre des Champs-Elysèes on April 17th of this year by Radio France.

Here is the rundown:

1.Robert Schumann
Scènes d'enfants Op.15 (1838)

2. Robert Schumann
Carnaval Op.9 (1934,1935)

3. Edvard Grieg
Six images poétiques Op.3 (1863)

4. Edvard Grieg
Sonate en mi mineur Op.7 (1865)

5. Franz Liszt
Mephisto valse N°1 S 514 (1856,1861)

6. Alexandre Scriabine
Etude en do dièse mineur op 2

7. Alexandre Scriabine
Etude en ré dièse mineur op 8 n°12

8. Serge Rachmaninov
Prélude en sol dièse mineur op 32 n°12

9. Grigori Ginzburg
Figaro Fantaisie d'après Rossini

10. Duke Ellington / Denis Matsuev
Improvisation sur le thème de Caravan

Concert donné le 17 avril 2012. Production Théâtre des Champs-Elysées.

The two Schumann pieces are on the top player and the rest of the concert (with all the encores) are on the bottom player.

Great concert, enthusiastic audience, wonderful repertoire. And all on an Anti-Road Rage Wednesday.

Life is good.

Over to Germany this week for a concert by the Wuppertal Symphony, conducted by Toshiyuki Kamioka and featuring legendary Hungarian pianist Dezso Ranki in music of Liszt and Bartok. The concert was broadcast live by WDR3 in Germany.

Here's what they play:

Montag, 23.04.12 um 20:05 Uhr
WDR 3 Städtekonzerte NRW
Live - Sinfonieorchester Wuppertal

Franz Liszt
Zwei Legenden

Béla Bartók
Klavierkonzert Nr. 2 Sz 95

Béla Bartók
Konzert für Orchester Sz 116

Dezsö Ránki, Klavier

Sinfonieorchester Wuppertal
Leitung: Toshiyuki Kamioka

Live aus der Historischen Stadthalle Wuppertal
Redaktion: Christoph Held

The concert is broken up between two players - the top player features the Liszt and the Bartok Piano Concerto and the bottom player features Concerto For Orchestra.

Announcements are in German, so drag out your translation books.

Otherwise, perfect Anti-Road Rage Wednesday music. No?

It was with sadness that I learned today of the passing of Maurice Sendak, the man who took the concept of Children's books to an entirely new level. His was a unique voice and vision and it will be missed.

I found an episode broadcast earlier today via NPR's Fresh Air program which features a remembrance of Sendak along with excerpts of several of the interviews he did for that program over the years.

If you haven't already heard it - here it is now.

Rest in Peace Maurice Sendak - you made surviving the day-to-day so much more bearable.

I always talk about how many concerts are broadcast any given day by the radio networks in Europe, and how many of them are live on-the-spot. Well, to prove that point, here is a concert that was recorded lived earlier today (8:00 pm Paris time - 11:00 am Los Angeles time) featuring Orchestre National de France led by podium superstar Daniele Gatti and featuring Antonio Meneses, cello in music by Faure`, Saint-Saens, Debussy and Ravel.

Both the orchestra and soloist are given rousing ovations and, as is customary, they play rousing encores.

Great concert all the way around, and to hear it live as-it's-happening is a bonus.

The concert is divided between two players and the intermission feature has been edited out (no interviews, just commercial recordings featuring Meneses) and the announcements have been edited down in order to take the concert down from its original three hours to a reasonable length.

Here's what's being played:

Part 1 - Gabriel Fauré

Pelléas et Mélisande, Musique de scène pour la pièce de Maeterlinck(1902)

Camille Saint-Saëns

Concerto N°1 en la mineur Op.33 (1869)

Part 2 - Claude Debussy

Jeux (1912)

Maurice Ravel

Daphnis et Chloé, Suite N°2 (1913)

Antonio Meneses, Violoncelle
Orchestre National de France
Daniele Gatti, Direction

Who says music is dead? Not around here.

Remember, it's Anti-Road Rage Wednesday so step away from the computer and turn the speakers up.

And enjoy.