“Classical music loves anniversaries — because, more than any other branch of the arts, it’s focused on looking at an increasingly distant past. Classical music comes into its own at times of commemoration and mourning: Even the mass audience tends to embrace classical music at a funeral. … Today, when classical music is eager to reassert its relevance to the world at large, this kind of historical presentation appeals to presenters. The question is whether these Armistice observances actually prove classical music’s relevance or simply serve to wrap history in a PBS soundtrack of nostalgia.”