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Have you ever wondered during a concert what the composer was thinking and feeling while he or she wrote the piece you are listening to? Or what the composer’s home town was like? Or how political events of the day affected the audience’s reception of that work? If you attend Carmel Bach Festival’s “Aha! Beethoven” program, all your questions will be answered in a timely manner amid myriad musical excerpts performed by world-class musicians and singers.

The world of music for two pianists is a rarified one. Established as an art form in the Mozart family for its two talented children, then popularized by Schubert at coffeehouses in Vienna, and finally made immortal by Brahms, the two-piano/four-hands repertoire has occupied an important but often neglected corner in the vast richness of piano music. The Milton and Peggy Salkind International Piano Duo Festival celebrates that repertoire.

At the young age of 16, saxophonist and San Francisco native Rent Romus had already experienced his first taste of producing and putting on shows for fellow artists and musicians. It was this innate passion as well as a love for underground music that inspired Romus to create, 36 years later, the Outsound New Music Summit, a Bay Area-based, artist-organized festival.

If you want to jazz up a birthday party or anniversary, do something unexpected or plan a surprise. Pianist Daniel Glover is doing something like that with the otherwise dull-as-dishwater Frédéric Chopin commemorations this year, by pairing Chopin with Samuel Barber, another anniversary boy. His recital for San Francisco’s Old First Concerts promises to reveal some interesting connections.

“It’s all about the music, silly!” Certainly that is true for most of the concerts SFCV previews and reviews. But what about Festival del Sole, which, after a private donor dinner the night before, kicks off in Napa Valley on July 16?

I became a fan of Peppino D’Agostino, who will be performing July 11 at the Mendocino Music Festival, through the world of classical music. In 1998, D’Agostino met David Tanenbaum at the Schorndorf Gitarren festival in Germany and received such positive feedback from the encounter that they decided to work together.

What happens behind the scenes at Music@Menlo, the summer chamber music festival and institute that begins its eighth season on the Peninsula on July 23, is as revealing of the festival’s essence as the musical events themselves. Attendees don’t realize the extent to which the 22 administrative interns’ cheerful spirit, youthful zaniness, and willingness to do anything and everything help to make the festival a vibrant, summer musical destination.

Filmmaker Michael Lawrence’s Bach and Friends has been making waves among classical listeners and audiences who might never have suspected they would have a connection to J.S. Bach’s music. In advance of the SFCV-sponsored premiere on July 14 at San Francisco’s Kabuki Cinema, Lawrence sat down to answer some questions about the film and his take on Bach’s music.

In some ways, pianist Joyce Yang is merely getting started. She graduated from the Juilliard School in May, and is still only age 23. When you look at her accomplishments to date, though, you’ll find that hard to believe. She has been called “the most gifted young pianist of her generation," and here she talks about music that moves people to tears, filming a documentary as the youngest in the Van Cliburn competition; and in her spare time — food, wine, and hitting the gym.