From The Top: Tiny Desk Concert
Tom Huizenga | January 14, 2026Something rather astonishing occurs when kids take over the Tiny Desk. Our very future of music-making is on display.
Over the years, we have invited some of the brightest young musicians in the county to play the Desk. They are alums of the organization From the Top, which over the past 25 years has provided a platform of radio broadcasts, online performances and fellowships to support young, enthusiastic players.
At only 17 years old, the Eugene, Ore., native Maria Telesheva is already an accordion wizard. I have trouble simply pushing the right button in an elevator. So watching Telesheva’s fingers fly gracefully over more than 200 buttons on her bayan, as the instrument is called in Russia, is a thrill. She makes the tightly braided voices in J.S. Bach’s thicket of counterpoint sing and dance.
Nine-year-old Alexander Zhou is a mega-watt entertainer with a winning smile and technique far beyond his age. Based in New York, where he attends a special music school, he’s already won a half-dozen international competitions. I’m uncertain, with his small hands, just how he gets to the deluge of notes in the Moszkowski show-stopper. He’ll have to learn completely new fingerings as he grows. He describes the music as having “light, crispy notes and also a brilliant, very mysterious vibe.”
The confident, 18-year-old Henry Drangel from Queens is a freshman at the Curtis Institute. To hear the sweet, pinging sound of a newly minted tenor voice is especially satisfying in an age when opera geeks are concerned about the state of vocal education. Drangel’s breath control, his sense of the singing Italian line and the sunshine in his voice should take him far. His adroit accompanist, Adam Jackson, is studying for his master’s degree at Juilliard.
If these three artists gathered here represent the future of classical music, then that future is shining brightly indeed.
SET LIST
Johann Sebastian Bach: J.S. Bach: Prelude and Fugue No. 2 in C minor (Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1)
Moritz Moszkowski: Étincelles, Op. 36, No. 6 (“Sparks”)
Gaetano Donizetti: “Quanto è bella” (from L’elisir d’amore)
MUSICIANS
Maria Telesheva: accordion
Alexander Zhou: piano
Henry Drangel: vocals
Adam Jackson: piano
TINY DESK TEAM
Producer: Tom Huizenga
Director/Editor: Kara Frame
Audio Technical Director: Neil Tevault
Host/Series Producer: Bobby Carter
Videographers: Kara Frame, Joshua Bryant
Audio Engineer: Josh Newell
Production Assistant: Dhanika Pineda
Photographer: Sofia Seidel
Tiny Desk Team: Maia Stern, Ashley Pointer
Series Editor: Lars Gotrich
Executive Producer: Suraya Mohamed
Executive Director: Sonali Mehta
Series Creators: Bob Boilen, Stephen Thompson, Robin Hilton
#tinydesk #nprmusic #fromthetop
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