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.
-
Classical 101The youngest ever winner of the Van Cliburn Piano Competition makes our trusty upright piano sound like a 9-foot grand in music by Liszt and Tchaikovsky. -
Riley’s pioneering piece, which premiered 60 years ago, leaves many decisions up to the performers. It helped launch the movement known as minimalism, but In C itself has also survived and changed. -
To mark the 150th anniversary of the maverick American composer’s birth, pianist Jeremy Denk releases an Ives tribute album that educates, delights and confounds. -
The countertenor’s sparkling personality shines brightly in a wide ranging set that includes jazz, classical and spirituals.
-
The rising young pianist, from a family of seven musical siblings, offers dynamic music by brother and sister Felix and Fanny Mendelssohn. -
The 86-year-old Kyiv native, living in exile in Berlin, has a new album of symphonic works that explores the idea of reminiscence. -
The Norwegian soprano, with plenty of horsepower, unleashes a high C, and much subtle singing, in a thrilling set. -
In Jim White's drumming, there's a restless wonder. On this 8 Tracks, we lead off with a sprawling rocker by his band Dirty Three, but also feature new music by Chappell Roan and Amber Mark. -
Armed with just her cello, a looping machine and a pair of percussionists, Beiser crafts a rendition of Terry Riley's pioneering In C that is equally mesmerizing and graceful. -
When he takes over, in the fall of 2027, he will be the youngest music director in the orchestra's 133-year history.
