The interview will be broadcast in its entirety during the live premiere of A Garland for Linda. Portions can also be heard during NPR's Peabody-award winning news program Morning Edition with Bob Edwards on Friday, June 2, 2000. NPR's Susan Stamberg and WNYC's John Schaefer will host the live broadcast concert from Riverside Church, and will feature works by Ralph Vaughan Williams as well as the American premiere of new choral arrangements of classic Beatles songs composed by McCartney and John Lennon. A Garland for Linda is a co-production of National Public Radio and WNYC Radio New York. Composers who contributed to A Garland for Linda include Sir Paul McCartney, Sir John Tavener, John Rutter, Judith Bingham, David Matthews, Roxanna Panufnik, Michael Berkeley, Giles Swayne, and Sir Richard Rodney Bennett.
Music does have an extraordinary power to move people and to provide a source of hope.
By lending his name and talents to the project, Sir Paul has brought into being an impressive array of works by leading composers - refreshingly contemporary, and squarely in the glorious tradition of English choral music. The loveliness and intensity of the nine pieces attest to that. The entire concert will be performed by The Riverside Festival Singers and conducted by Helen Cha-Pyo. Flutist Demari McGill and cellist Pitnary Shin will complement the Singers. The first broadcast was the American premiere of McCartney's symphony Standing Stone performed by the Orchestra of St. Luke's, conducted by Lawrence Foster at Carnegie Hall in November 1997.