“From the Top” can be heard on Saturdays at 6PM on KBYU Classical 89 (89.1 FM and 89.5 FM).

Watch the following video to learn more about From the Top:

Christopher O'Riley has redefined the possibilities of classical music through media, contemporary music and innovative programming. In addition to hosting From the Top and appearing with top orchestras and festivals around the world, Mr. O'Riley is also an interpreter of some of the most important contemporary popular music of our time. He lives by the Duke Ellington adage, "there are only two kinds of music, good music and bad." O'Riley has performed two-piano arrangements of Astor Piazzolla's tangos with Argentine pianist Pablo Ziegler, collaborated with choreographer Martha Clarke in a work which sets the staged stories of Anton Chekhov to the piano works of Alexander Scriabin, and has recorded two discs of his own re-imaginings of Radiohead songs. In April 2006, his third set of transcriptions was released on the same label. Entitled "Home to Oblivion; An Elliott Smith Tribute," Mr. O'Riley this time tackles the deeply emotional and complex work of the troubled singer/songwriter who died prematurely in 2003. His most recent CD, Second Grace: Music of Nick Drake, interprets the work of singer/songwriter Nick Drake. Next season he will play a series of recitals that intertwine his own piano transcriptions with classical compositions. These will debut at Columbia University's Miller Theatre and feature Claude Debussy/Nick Drake; Robert Schumann/Elliott Smith and Dimitri Shostakovich/Radiohead. A recipient of top prizes and awards from the Van Cliburn Competition and the Avery Fisher Career Grants, O'Riley is a graduate of the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston.