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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The 12th-century abbess, scientist and composer inspires new interpretations of her music on an album spotlighting soprano Barbara Hannigan. -
The Pulitzer-winning composer wants her music to speak to everyone, from farmers to children to the classical intelligentsia. -
The pontiff, who possessed a sizable record collection, was a keen listener. Hear his favorite tracks — from Bach to Piazzolla — and a few more that might have caught his discerning ear. -
The classical guitarist offers a mesmerizing East meets West collision, teaming up with a family of Indian musicians who play the sarod, a darker-toned cousin of the sitar. -
From plumbing pipes and rice bowls to vibraphones and one big bass drum, Sandbox Percussion makes mesmerizing music that you have to see to believe. -
The soprano and her pianist husband offer a deeply considered look at the human condition through seven distinct songs. -
The famed Frenchman brings all his elegance and colorful playing to the Tiny Desk with music by Ravel, Brahms and Villa-Lobos. -
One of the first modern women composers to reach international acclaim, Gubaidulina's singular style was often large in scope, both musically and philosophically, yet intimate in the painterly details she conjured from an orchestra. -
The versatile artist offers his singular blend of global, jazz and classical sounds, pushing both his cello and his voice into uncharted territory. -
On his new album, Dreamcatcher, James McVinnie offers a fresh take on the venerable, and often misunderstood, pipe organ.
