Susan Lewis
Arts & Culture Senior ProducerAs senior producer of arts and culture, Susan writes and produces stories about music and the arts. She’s host and producer of WRTI’s TIME IN online interview series, and producer of The Philadelphia Orchestra in Concert series, to which she also contributes weekly intermission interviews. She’s also been a regular host of WRTI’s Live from the Performance Studio sessions.
In her more than 15 years at WRTI, Susan has interviewed a wide range of leading artists including conductors and composers: Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Simon Rattle, Wynton Marsalis, Marin Alsop, and Mirga Gražinytė-Tyla, Christoph Eshenbach, Hannibal Locumbe, Esa-Pekka Salonen, Jennifer Higdon, Donald Nally, John Adams, Valerie Coleman, Mason Bates; instrumentalists and vocalists: Yo-Yo Ma, Lang Lang, Itzak Perlman, Helene Grimaud, Sheku Kanneh-Mason, Sharon Isbin, Andre Watts, Mark O’Connor, Angel Blue, Lawrence Brownlee, Jason Vieaux, Sarah Chang, and groundbreaking ensembles, including Imani Winds, PRISM Quartet, LA Guitar Quartet, Eighth Blackbird, and The Crossing, as well as people from the world of literature, theater and fine arts, including architect Frank Gehry, actors Dule Hill, Anna Deveare Smith, and playwrights Terry Teachout and the late Terrence McNally.
Susan came to radio with a background in journalism, speechwriting, and law, which she practiced in New York City; she also taught entertainment law at Rutgers Law School in Camden. A former freelance writer and columnist for Philadelphia Magazine, she’s also the author of Reinventing Ourselves after Motherhood and a book of essays titled, What is a Kiss, Anyway?
She lives in suburban Philadelphia with her husband, goldendoodle, and whichever of her four grown kids pop in to visit.
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The true story of a 19th-century swindler in New York City inspired not only an opera, but also a concerto. WRTI’s Susan Lewis has more on… -
Classical composer Michael Daugherty, who won two 2017 Grammy Awards, writes music about ideas, people, and places from popular culture. As WRTI’s Susan…
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Oscar Wilde’s late 19th-century play, retelling the biblical story of Salome, became the basis for Richard Strauss' one-act opera SALOME that premiered in…
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Born in Germany in 1946, André Watts moved to Philadelphia with his Hungarian mother and American father when he was 8 years old. As WRTI’s Susan Lewis…
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The path to landing a full-time position as an orchestral musician can be a rocky and competitive climb. As WRTI’s Susan Lewis reports, one successful…
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It was the late 1920s when French composer Maurice Ravel first heard jazz in the United States and in Paris, where it was also popular. How did it…
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Gypsy Jazz founders Django Reinhardt and Stephane Grappelli were both born this month in the first decade of the 20th century. Rooted in African-American…
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In 1927, Duke Ellington’s orchestra opened at New York’s Cotton Club. As WRTI’s Susan Lewis reports, it was a gig that would fire up Ellington’s career…
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Is leading a symphony orchestra anything like playing chess? As WRTI’s Susan Lewis reports, one very busy conductor, Alain Altinoglu, is drawn to both.…
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The play Black Nativity by Langston Hughes opened in New York in 1961, and was adapted for film in 2013. As WRTI’s Susan Lewis reports, New Freedom…
