captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc >> ifill: good evening. i'm gwen ifill >> woodruff: and i'm judy woodruff. >> ifill: on the newshour tonight: the raucous primary campaign tightens as donald trump reaches out, jeb bush goes on offense, bernie sanders rises and hillary clinton hands over her private email server. >> woodruff: china's currency falls further, wall street is jolted but recovers for the day- - what a weakened yuan means for american pocketbooks and paychecks. >> ifill: plus, changing the face of classical music, nurturing talent at an early age, to train a new generation of diverse musicians. >> when we're engaging with our instruments, it's just us ourselves our instruments and our music, and when we're playing with other people it's all of that to the nth power,

>> woodruff: all that and more on tonight's pbs newshour. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: ♪ ♪ moving our economy for 160 years. bnsf, the engine that connects us. >> supported by the john d. and catherine t. macarthur foundation. committed to building a more

just, verdant and peaceful world. more information at macfound.org >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. >> woodruff: enormous explosions tore through a container port tonight in northeastern china. officials reported at least 13 dead and up to 400 injured. it happened in tianjin, at a warehouse for hazardous materials, shortly before midnight, local time. police said the first blast lit off a much larger one, with the force of 21 tons of t.n.t. it sent a gigantic fireball into the air, and the shock wave sent people flooding into hospitals.

>> ifill: former president jimmy carter announced this afternoon he has cancer. in a statement, he said recent surgery showed it's spread from his liver to other parts of his body. he said he'll begin treatment in atlanta. in a recent interview with the newshour, the 39th president noted that both his parents and all three siblings died of cancer. >> they all smoked cigarettes. and i never have smoked a cigarette. so, i think that may be a triggering device to some genetic factor. i don't know what the background is. but the health service of america kind of adopted me as a target. we were the only family in the world for a number of years that was known to have pancreatic cancer deaths in four members. >> ifill: former president carter is 90 years old. >> woodruff: protesters in arlington, texas say they'll keep demanding criminal charges in the police killing of christian taylor. the unarmed, college football player was killed friday night

at an auto dealership. last night, the arlington police chief fired officer brad miller, citing "serious concerns" about his actions. >> these concerns, however, are best addressed through the criminal investigation process. however, based on the preponderance of the evidence available to me and the facts revealed by the investigative team, i have decided to terminate officer miller's employment with the arlington police department for exercising poor judgment. >> woodruff: the chief said it's clear from security video that taylor vandalized vehicles at the auto lot and drove one into the building. but, he said, that does not excuse the officer's mistakes. >> ifill: a new blaze added to california's wildfire woes today. this one is burning across 26 square miles, north of san francisco. gusty winds have spread the flames, and more than 1,100 firefighters are on the fire lines.

but, they're not expected to have it contained until monday. at least 150 people had have to leave their homes, including some who just recently had to run from another big fire. >> woodruff: it's not fire, but floods in myanmar-- the worst in decades. officials say more than a million people are "critically affected". nearly 4,000 were evacuated today from the stricken capital of chin state, in the southeast asian nation. mudslides triggered by torrential rains have destroyed hundreds of homes in low-lying areas since late june. more than 100 people have died. >> ifill: beleaguered officials in greece bolstered security today on a holiday island where tensions with migrants are growing. they're fleeing war in syria and elsewhere, but finding little relief. harry smith of independent television news has this report. >> reporter: by night and day, they're coming ashore now in their thousands.

it's just a short crossing from turkey to the island of kos. but the celebrations are short lived. the authorities here are overwhelmed. 2,000 of the new arrivals have been locked in a football stadium without food, water, shade or sanitation. they have to be registered before they can move on. those with the strength to do so push to try to reach the front of the queue. >> i think it's very bad, very bad. >> reporter: a medical team from medecins sans frontieres said they've been struggling to treat the numbers overcome by the heat-- many of them children. they said it was not prepared. no access for water.

we don't have water for other people. >> reporter: these pictures-- said to have been taken today in the damascus suburb of ghouta-- provide a sharp reminder of why so many are so desperate to cross the sea to europe. the route to greece has become the most popular crossing since the fighting in libya made the trip to italy too dangerous. but they are now arriving in a country already struggling with a crisis of its own. extra riot police have been sent to kos and other islands in the aeagean to help control the influx. there have also been calls for more ferries to take the migrants to the mainland. but that only moves the problem somewhere else. >> ifill: the greek government said it's also sending a cruise liner to kos, to be converted into a processing center for the migrants. >> woodruff: and wall street was a roller coaster today as china allowed its currency to fall for a second day. the dow jones industrial average dropped 277 points before heading back up.

in the end, the dow was just a fraction of a point lower, closing near 17,400. the nasdaq rose seven points and the s&p 500 added two. still to come on the newshour: politics, policy and polls on the campaign trail, hillary clinton agrees to hand over her private email server, how china's currency could affect american business and jobs. plus, much more. >> ifill: the last few days have brought yet another twist in the already dramatic race for president with a new hampshire poll showing democratic senator bernie sanders ahead of hillary clinton for the first time. political director lisa desjardins reports on the changing campaign landscape in both political parties.

>> reporter: the blur of could bees and would bees is now moving to the beginning of a defining 2016 horse race including a twist on the democratic race. when bernie sanders entered, it was unlikely he could shake the assumption hillary clinton would be the democratic nominee but momentum is big league his way in the northeast. sanders has a 17 point lead over clinton in a new hampshire poll yesterday, trailing by wide plargs in national polls. but sanders' biggest numbers are his cloud numbers. he has attracted eye popping audiences like this one, 27,000 people at a rally in los angeles over the weekend. that's more than either democrats or republicans have seen. as hillary clinton pushes policy ideas including college tuition cuts, sanders' message of income inequality is resonating. here earning endorsement of a national nurses union.

>> the march on washington, was called jobs and justice. >> reporter: mean while on the g.o.p. side, it's still anyone's race. in iowa, donald trump leads, followed by these three republicans. but take a look at the latest new hampshire poll, and those faces behind trump change completely. as for trump -- >> we're going to have a little fun tonight. >> reporter: -- the c.e.o. is looking to expand his need, campaigning in more places like this event in michigan last night. not that trump is without problems. he lost a top advisor this weekend following sharp comments about fox news anchor megyn kelly. as trump aims to keep first place -- >> we're facing an i.s.i.s. and its ideology. what it is is to borrow a phrase, the focus of evil in the modern world. >> reporter: -- jeb bush, who was thought to be potential frontrunner before he entered the race is hoping to gain the top spot using foreign policy. he outlined it in this address

at the reagan library last night during president obama and hillary clinton's for the rise to have the islamic state in iraq. >> where was secretary of state clinton in all this? like the president, she opposed the surge, then joined in claiming credit for its success, then stood by as the hard-won victory by american and allied forces was thrown away. >> reporter: as for clinton, this week, she indicated she's ready for challenges from both sides. >> i'm looking forward to debating, first my friends and colleagues in the democratic side, and then, you know, finally having a chance to debate the republicans about whatever their nominee has to say. >> reporter: of course, all candidates will have much more to say in the days and weeks ahead. for the pbs "newshour", i'm lisa desjardins in washington. >> ifill: hillary clinton's surprise move to turn her personal email server to the justice department followed new details that some of them contained classified information.

secretary clinton has been responding to questions about her email correspondence for months. >> i did not email any classified material to anyone on my email. there is no classified material. so i'm certainly well aware of the classification requirements and did not send classified material. i am confident that i never sent nor received any information that was classified at the time it was sent and received. this is really a question for the state department. they're the ones that are bearing the responsibility to, you know, sort through these thousands and thousands of e-mails and determine at what pace they can be released, and, you know, i really hope that it would be as quickly as possible. >> ifill: and we are joined now by anita kumar, white house correspondent for mcclatchy

newspapers. anita, we just saw the way her answers have changed ever so slightly over the summer. what is the difference between what she said the answer to these questions when they first came up and now? >> i think there is a lot of similarities. she said -- she stuck to the fact that she did not send or receive classified information. now, her responses changed because she said she would not give up the server, she would not give up the thumb drives with the e-mails, and she's clearly changed her mind about that. but what she has said still is she didn't send or receive classified information. >> ifill: the other thing she said in a statement her campaign put out today is she was only one four secretaries of state asked to turn over these e-mails who did. is that so? >> yeah, the investigation is actually into the five. they looked at the last five secretaries of state and their aides. they're allowed to look at the aides. their jurisdiction is to look at the aides so they are looking at that, but she said i've turned over mr. information than anyone else. she also was the last sitting

secretary of state and probably more email than anyone. >> ifill: and probably the only one actually running for president. so let's talk about what we think or what she has said is on this thumb drive in this classified server or -- not a classified server -- private server she turned over today. what does she say is in it? >> she had 60,000 e-mails on the server, it was everything she e-mailed, personal and work email while she was secretary of state for four years. she turned 30,000 over to the state department, and the others she said were personal and wiped it clean. so it's really unclear what's on the server now. i've talked to experts who say you can get rid of everything on a server, and then some who say unless you know what you're doing you can't get rid of everything. >> ifill: so wiped clean, not just for storage reasons. >> if you delete for storage, it's still there. you have to use the appropriate tools. these are technology experts that say it depends on the tools she used. if someone is in the field and

knows what they're doing, they might be wiped clean. >> ifill: clinton's aides are being looked into as well? >> they're looking into some of her top aides who used personal email for work as well. at least one ade also had an account on clinton's private server. >> ifill: one of the things that secretary clinton said is that she didn't use -- send anything to her home server that was classified at the time. >> right. >> ifill: what is the distinction between what's classified, sensitive and what may have been purely personal? can you reclassify things? >> you can later and that's what's happening. there were no markings that said something was classified. that's what she's relying on. her language is very clear. there were no markings, she says. but what is happening now is since the state department is looking through them, they're releasing them to the public, part of a lawsuit that says they

have to release state department e-mails, they're looking through and redacting things that need to be redacted. some of it is personal. they're not listing someone's email address. there are other things, doesn't mean it's classified or top secret. but the inspector general for the intelligence community has started to look for at the mails and that's where the five e-mails come in that he says are classified. not that they were at the time but they should be classified. >> ifill: it is easy to confuses personal when the person is running for president a legal dilemma with a political dilemma. how is this being treated by all the parties, as a legal question or is it a mix of all of it? >> isn't everything political? >> ifill: yeah, i suppose. there are legal questions, no doubt about it, but the f.b.i. which is looking into the matter, the inspector generals of two agencies looking into it have been very clear that what they're doing is not a criminal investigation at this time. that doesn't mean it wouldn't be at some point. it could be, we'll see what happens, but there are very

adamant she is not the target of a criminal probe right now. so that could change. i think it's really politics now. i'm not saying no one did anything wrong, but the ramifications for her is politics. >> ifill: there is also a house investigation still outstanding. >> yes, there is a house investigation and she's going to testify october 22, so that will be a big deal. and the other thing that keeps coming up is the state department is releasing the e-mails. they have to, as part of a lawsuit. so at the end of every month -- and we'll see in at the end of august, we'll see more e-mails. every time a new batch comes out, there is all sorts of new stories to talk ability. >> ifill: we know who will be reading them all. anita kumar, mcclatchy newspapers, thank you very much. that for u.s. companies doing a >> woodruff: world stock and currency markets were rocked for a second straight day today as china continued to devalue its

currency, the yuan. while the drop is not expected to have a big affect on most americans, and the tumult on wall street had calmed by day's end, some analysts are saying that for u.s. companies doing a lot of business inside china-- among them, apple, coca-cola, and fast food retailer yum brands-- the change could hurt sales and trim profits. for more on china's move and its ripple effects we turn to eswar prasad, professor of trade policy at cornell university and mike mcdonough, chief global economist at bloomberg intelligence. we can toll you both. eswar prasad, to you first, what does it say that the cheese banks second day in a row decided to let its currency be decide id by market forces? >> china is doing what it said it would do which is to let the currencies be determined by the market, and the market wants to push the yuan a little lower

because china's economy isn't doing so well, but there is a good side to it because china has been trying to open up its capital account, that is to make it easier for money to flow in and out of china and for good reasons, for diversification and so forth, a lot of money had been going out of china because households and corporations want to invest abroad. the difficulty is china is undertaking this move in a time when it's good for china but not necessarily the rest of the world. the chinese economy has been weak, the central bank has been trying to do everything it can to prop up the economy, reduce interest rates, reduce the amount chinese banks have to keep at the central bank so there can be more credit for the economy, now they're turning to the currency as an added boost. this may be good for china but it will be complicated for the rest of the world. >> woodruff: mike mcdonough, are we better able to today to tell whether this is driven by a drew desire for reform to let these currency rates be

determined by market forms or is it all about boosting china's lagging growth rate? >> well, i think eswar hit the nail on the head where the timing is perfect. it's about the reform but it's also about the devaluation you saw. basically, china took a measure that is certainly going to help bolster their export sector but put a caveat on tend saying, going forward, we'll let the market set the rate. so if you were a policymaker, you got exactly what you want. but the problem is, by doing the sudden devaluation, they did lose a bit of credibility. so there's talk about the yuan, the i.m.f. recognizing it as a global currency. what they need to do is prove, follow through, continue letting the market set the yuan. what you're seeing and why you're seeing so much turbulence in the market is because they did the 2%, they lost the credibility.

people are scared now. people are concerned that if china continues slowing down, they're going to do another one off the valuation, and that's a big risk. they need to follow through. there is an execution risk. they need to follow through with what they said. >> woodruff: eswar prasad, i know there are global implications, but let's focus on the united states. we mentioned u.s. companies deeply invested in china. where do they stand to comout of this or is it too early to know yet? >> so far, the devaluation has been modest and the u.s. dollar has been strong in the last year, appreciated about 20% to other currencies. there is only one major currency it is appreciated by this 2% devaluation and that's the chinese yuan. so this is adjusting for that a little bit. for the u.s. it will be slightly uncomfortable if the yuan and every other major currency is on

the other side trying to weaken their currency for the dollar. for countries operating in china, a double blow. this notes the chinese economy will remain weak and the government in china is certainly very concerned about the weakness in the economy, so that's going to affect earnings of a company like apple in china. but in addition a lot of the foreign earnings in china and elsewhere are going to be affected when that money comes back to the u.s. because the u.s. dollar is stronger and china is going to keep the dollar stronger than it would otherwise be and that will hurt earnings in dollars, so it could potentially be a double blow for companies like apple operating in china. >> woodruff: mike mcdonough, what would you add to that? what do you see as its effect in the u.s.? >> what you need to look at isn't the devaluation. it was relatively minor. the problem is why did they do it? china's economy is hurting. it is slowing down. they're doing everything they can to stable -- in a best-case scenario, in my view, china --

they don't have a resurgence in growth, they stabilize growth. so you have the world's second largest economy, which has been this big tailwind for global growth, not just in the u.s. but everywhere. they're a big consumer of our exports, suddenly sputtering. so the tailwind is becoming a head wind. that's the real concern. it's not the devaluation. it's why did they do it. china's economy is slowing. demand is slowing for goods in general, and that's the real problem. they need to basically bowie growth. >> woodruff: that has effect on countries around the globe and in the u.s. these companies we mentioned and others. i think some american consumers may also be asking is this going to affect me. >> for the american consumers, it could be a mixed blessing because if china's currency continues to weaken and if other currencies around the world try to weaken themselves even more to compete more effectively with china, that's going to win a

stronger dollar. the stronger dollar means a couple of good things for u.s. consumers. number one, cheaper imports from the rest of the world and, second, lower interest rates because even if the fed were to hike policy rates, long-term rates in the u.s. are likely to remain lower and that's what determine mortgage rates, auto loan rates and so on, so all good for u.s. consumers. but some sectors of the economy are very export-oriented that will get hurt because, first of all, foreign companies will be much more competitive here and americans will find it much harder to export to the rest of the world. so the benefits are going to be widespread but the pain is going to be concentrated in some sectors that could face fairly significant job losses and the loss of economic momentum. >> woodruff: mike mcdonough, quickly, what do you suspect now? what are you looking for now as we watch what china is doing? >> you know, i think, you know, china is going to have to continue implementing a bit more

stimulus. i think they have the fire power to at least stabilize growth that you've seen in china, but i think you're not going to see the china of the past. china is going to continue to slow. they're going to try to stabilize the slowdown, they're going to try to continue to reform their economy and they're going to continue opening up, but it is going to be these basically short cycles where everyone gets really euphoric about china because they think things are looking better, then implement reforms, signs things are sputtering again, then concerns about the hard landing. right now we're in a down period, but eventually things will stabilize. it will be panic and euphoric phases going on in china. >> woodruff: they've certainly gotten everyone's attention in the last few days. mike mcdonough with bloomberg, eswar prasad with cornell university, thank you both. >> thank you very much. .

>> ifill: stay with us. coming up on the newshour: why a major opponent of the iran nuclear deal changed his mind, unleashing musical gifts early in life and the rise of heroin in the heartland of small-town america. but first, tonight we launch a series of conversations on the pros and cons of the contentious debate over the nuclear agreement with iran, which congress has 36 more days to review. deal or no deal. tonight, hari sreenivasan talks to a well respected nuclear expert who just resigned as president of a group which publicly opposes it. >> sreenivasan: gary samore helped establish the advocacy group "united against a nuclear iran" in 2008, before serious negotiations had begun over iran's nuclear program. the goal: strengthen sanctions against tehran in the face of what samore and others believed was a clandestine nuclear program. from 2009 to 2013, samore served as president obama's white house

coordinator for arms control and weapons of mass destruction, while serious talks between the so-called "p5+1" and iran were underway. after leaving the white house, samore went to the belfer center for science and international affairs at harvard's kennedy school of government when the nuclear deal was signed with iran last month, there was near-unanimous opposition to the pact from samore's fellow members of the anti-iran-nuclear advocacy group-- it is resuming a multi-million dollar advertising campaign denouncing the deal. but samore's judgment was different-- he was satisfied with the iran agreement, and he has now stepped down as the group's president. on monday, former connecticut democratic and independent senator joseph lieberman-- a decided opponent of the iran deal-- was named as the chairman of "united against a nuclear iran". and gary samore joins me now. so you worked with an organization at least for the past two years, you helped lead an organization that's core mission was to prevent iran from getting nuclear weapons. what made you want to step down?

>> well, as you said, i disagreed with the organization on whether or not to support the agreement. in my judgment, this agreement is the best available option to prevent iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. others in the group came to a different conclusion. ii respect that, but under the circumstances, i didn't feel i could continue to be president of the organization at the same time that they were mount ago campaign to -- mounting a campaign to encourage congress to reject a agreement. >> sreenivasan: are they wrong? they seem to be doubling down to convince kong and the u.s. public this is a bad deal. >> i think understand their views. i think there are elements of this agreement i'm not comfortable with. i think it leaves iran with a larger enrichment program than i would prefer and i think the duration of the agreement isn't as long as i would like. but on the other hand, i think the agreement has some positive elements. it constraints iran's ability to produce fissile material for nuclear weapons and declared

facilities for at least 15 years and establishes a verification and enforcement mechanism that i think will improve our ability to catch iran cheating and our ability to reimpose sanctions. so on balance, i think the advantages outweigh the disadvantages and i'm skeptical we can negotiate a significantly better deal within a short period of time. >> sreenivasan: let's talk about some of those concerns. you've expressed this in writings and speeches and elsewhere. one of the concerns you had with was that iran, even in a recent paper that you published at the bell ft. center, is this might increase iran's ability to create nuclear weapons in a covert manner. while there might be opportunities for us to catch that, it doesn't prevent it. >> well, i think you have to recognize that any inspection mechanism will have strengths and weaknesses. the system that the agreement puts in place will improve our ability to catch iran if they

try to build secret facilities to process nuclear material, like a covert enrichment plant. we already have good capability through national intelligence and by working with our allies and their national intelligence agencies, but the agreement i think will amplify our national intelligence. in other areas like weaponization research, it's very difficult for either national intelligence or an inspection system to really have confidence in catching and detecting that kind of activity. so on balance, i think you have to say that the agreement strengthens our ability to deal with any effort by iran to build a covert nuclear processing facility that probably is not going to be able to catch them if they do small-scale weapons research. >> sreenivasan: what about the time limits? you said you were a little uncomfortable. you said you wished it was longer. but in these 10 to 15 years, do

we clamp down enough on their ability to enrich uranium? >> i think, for 15 years, the limits on enrichment and the limits on their efforts to construct any capability to produce plutonium are very solid at the declared facilities, so iran really won't have an option to produce fissile material for nuclear weapons for at least 15 years. even at year 15, when the physical limits are lifted, it would still take iran a couple more years to expand its prom and have a credible capacity. the gamble, of course, is that we just don't have any way of predicting, in 15 years, what kind of government in iran we're going to be facing, and the concern is that we may still have a government in tehran in 15 years that has ambitions to develop nuclear weapons, and the question will be whether whoever is president at that time, whether they're going to be able to reassemble international pressure if iran has actually

complied with this agreement for 15 years. >> sreenivasan: one of the lines from critics is was there a better deal to be had? was the extension of sanctions, perhaps, over a longer period of time, would that have forced iran to the table in less of a strong position? >> you know, it's very difficult to replay history, and unless you're actually sitting in the negotiating room, i think it's very hard to make a judgment about whether a better deal -- significantly better deal could have been negotiated, so i'm not really able to make that judgment. the question, i think, is this deal compared to a better deal if we reject it and try to renegotiate. and i think, in the near term, it's unlikely that we could negotiate a deal that would be significantly better. my judgment at the end of the day is that it's better to have a bird in hand than two in the bush, and i think this deal is good enough so that we should support it.

>> sreenivasan: gary samore, thanks so much for joining us. >> thank you, hari. >> woodruff: next, if you take a look at musical orchestras across the country, you'll find a striking lack of black and latino players. for more than 30 years, project step, based just beneath the symphony hall stage in boston, has been trying to change that. now its mentoring program for young musicians is even getting attention from the white house. jared brown of pbs station wgbh in boston has the story. ♪ >> reporter: they have all the bearings of the classically trained and the classically gifted. years of study at play, despite

their few years. ♪ and they are, in many respects, the unlikely. >> some kids are born with a musicality that really shows through at age five. you can see it in the way that they move to music, you can see it in the way that they follow rhythms. >> one, two, three, four. ♪ >> reporter: mary jaffee is the executive director of project step-- a boston organization that teases talent out of kids who might otherwise find it squandered. her mission is simple: to change the face of classical music. >> there are so few in fact, virtually almost no african american and latino musicians in orchestras and in audiences. >> reporter: since 1982, project step has pushed to correct that imbalance. each year it fans out across

boston kindergarten classes, identifying students with unusual potential. >> from that 50-100 kids, we take in three to four a year, so it's a very narrow bottle neck. those kids are highly talented. >> so the trick is to play them all in the right time. >> reporter: these young children are among the finalists for acceptance into the project step program. if chosen, they'll be plunged into an intensive music immersion program. from now until they graduate high school, they'll take weekly classes, receive one-on-one lessons and they're expected to complete hours of at-home practice. and that's all on top of their regular schoolwork. at this last stage of selection, the students are divided into small groups for a month of violin lessons in june. perfecting how they hold their bow, position their feet and read music. susan jarvis has been teaching the class for 13 years-- scrutinizing their mastery of music. >> it's a matter of finding

which child, which children can adapt to it the fastest. every child can do it in their own time, but some kids are more-- maybe a little more-- innately coordinated or have a really strong interest in it. >> hands up if you know where a string is. >> reporter: they are so young! >> these guys are old! these are a joy to teach every year because they're five and six years old. that's a big difference from the three and four year olds which i normally teach. >> reporter: just as important as the music is what happens at home. project step will select only students who have full parental involvement. in class, they are fully behind the students. >> let's get some help from your parents-- they're gonna be your beat partners. they're gonna keep the eyes on the music and you're gonna keep your eyes on your fingers. ♪ the parents are the lifeline.

we work pretty hard to tell the parents what to do, how to do it and how many times to do it. because in teaching a string instrument, there's just not a lot of room for error at the beginning. ♪ >> personally, music calms me down. it makes me feel good inside. >> reporter: at 11-years-old, ajani boyd has now played with project step longer than he hasn't. he's all about the bass now, but he was four when he chose the cello. >> i picked the cello. and honestly, i kind of picked the cello because i could sit down. >> reporter: he can be forgiven the easy choice given the program's demands today-- practice daily and up to nine hours every saturday. >> its pretty intense. the new measure of 10,000 hours of preparation, rehearsal, practice. whatever it is, they put it in by the time they're in high school. it's just an awful lot. >> reporter: but it served njeri grevious well-- she's now a sophomore at yale university

studying mathematics. do you think about what would have been if you didn't have an opportunity like this? >> very difficult, almost impossible. i actually don't want to think about that. i've been so blessed. >> reporter: grevious spent 12 years in project step including a time, she says, when her family was left homeless. >> when we were living out of the car, when sometimes it was very, very cold waking up in the morning, no heating in the house, and waking up and trying to practice. we're able to put all of that aside. because when we're engaging with our instruments, its just us ourselves our instruments and our music. and when we're playing with other people, it's all of that to the nth power. and we're able to find peace and solace. >> reporter: working off a tight budget with money it receives from foundations and individual donors, project step subsidizes virtually all the students'

expenses-- roughly $9,000 to $11,000 annually. it gives them opportunity, while their base in the basement of symphony hall gives them access. >> we had one parent put it that she didn't think she could touch symphony hall and she used to walk by it and thought it just wasn't for her. and now she's learned to navigate the halls and say hello to some of the musicians. >> reporter: and even play with them. there are not many people --let alone 11-year-olds-- who can claim to have performed on-stage with one of the most famous musicians of our time. >> here is yo-yo ma, and a little bit next to him is me. that was an incredible opportunity that i got, and i will never forget that moment. >> reporter: the moments don't get much bigger though than when project step was honored by the white house late last year with a national arts and humanities youth program award presented by first lady michelle obama. >> that's just crazy to be able

to say when i came back from the white house. going to the white house was amazing, it was a crazy experience. i got to meet a lot of people, got to meet the first lady. so it was just awesome, and all. >> reporter: all of this is a testament to the music and the instruction. that in an age of attention deficits, these students will practice thousands of hours. in moments of crisis, music is their salvation. all of project step's 60 students have graduated high school and half of them have gone on to the country's most prestigious ivy league schools or conservatories. and jaffee says more than half of them are now professional musicians themselves. does the program change lives? >>it does change lives, i believe it does change lives. it certainly changed my life. >> reporter: and many others through the power of music. this is jared bowen from wgbh for the pbs newshour in boston.

>> ifill: we'll be back with a look at the american heroin epidemic. but first, take a moment to hear from your local pbs station.

>> ifill: now, the latest addition to the newshour bookshelf. according to the centers for disease control, heroin usage in the u.s. has doubled among young adults in the last decade and deaths have quadrupled. former "los angeles times" reporter sam quinones looks at what's driving that surge in his new book "dreamland: the true tale of america's opiate epidemic". he recently talked with jeffrey brown and painted a graphic

portrait of a national problem. is is the quietest drug epidemic or scourge we've lad in this country in the last 50 or 60 years. no public violence is associated, not like crack where people battle for street corners. people are dieing aloan in their bedrooms or a mcdonald's bathroom. families are stigmatized and mortified that their kids are addicted and die of this stuff. >> brown: this came from reporting on the drug trade in mexico and the u.s. what grabbed your attention. >> my reporting a story of one small town in mexico on the pacific coast where everybody in that town had migrated to the united states, had developed a system for selling heroin. they were master heroin retailers in the united states, selling heroin like pizza, a delivery model, and they had used this system to employ hundreds of people in the town

and spread across the country, so they were in half the country. what i also came to understand, though, was they had this enormous market for heroin. one small town became one of the major suppliers of heroin to the united states. that market was due entirely to a whole new supply of addicts who got addicted to prescription painkillers. >> brown: so it's a tale of two kinds of drugs, two opiates. >> two opiates. >> brown: one is legal in the u.s., prescription drugs for pain. >> right. >> brown: and then there's a heroin market on top of that and they're somehow linked. >> what connects them is this is a new kind of drug trafficking in a sense. it's all based on branding and marketing. it's no longer based on the old style of gun play and shootouts for street corners and that kind of scuff. >> brown: it's not the cartels we have been hearing with the violence. >> these are the anti-cartels, the anti-scar face, these guys are all about low profile,

they're all about branding their ugs where you make sure when you buy a balloon of heroin, you know what's in it, you can call if it's no good and have it replace it. at the same time, the companies that promoted the pills have also used branding and marketing to convince doctors all across america that these pills can be used without risk, without risk of addiction, virtually non-addictive when used to address pain killing. >> brown: that is where the story starts in the u.s., right, is the rise of these kinds of pills that many people are familiar with, whether you're an athlete or all kinds of people, right? >> right. >> brown: pain, you get prescribed these kinds of pills. and you were told they were non-addictive. or mostly non-addictive. >> you weren't told anything. you were just given a big bunch of pills. i had my appendix out, they gave me 670 vicodin to take home. the message is no matter how many pills are in here, they're

not addictive. this is common practice across the country because to have the pain revolution that took place in the '80s and '90s, gaining momentum then. >> brown: a benefit to people. these are legitimate pills and people use them to great benefit and it has assuaged the pain, chronic as well as surgical pain. the problem is there is not a lot of attempt to determine who should be taking them, how many pills they should take home with them and there is not a lot of time spent by doctors on dealing with maybe a patient's history of addiction, say, in the past, do you have any addiction, a history of alcoholism. >> brown: what's been the result? you describe it throughout middle america, especially. >> right. >> brown: an epidemic? what do you see? >> i see epidemic. i see a scourge that has attacked communities that are completely unprepared for this. they've never seen anything like it. it's families who never really had this kind of addiction to hard drugs ever in their lives.

it's hitting rural areas. it's hitting suburban areas. athletes, now it seems to me, frankly, that at times football is almost a gateway to heroin addiction because so many football players are treated for chronic pain with these pills. they then get addicted and eventually, if not treated, eventually you have to transition to heroin after using these pills. >> brown: what kind of awareness is there now, either in the medical community, in government, what is or could be done? >> i think what needs to be happen is very much what began happening with the aids epidemic and that is a recognition and talking a lot about it, removing that stigma. once you remove it, then people who are new to it can figure out what their kids need. but that's what has nod happened. that's why i think it has spread. >> brown: the book is "dreamland." sam quinones. thank you so much. >> my pleasure. thank you.

>> woodruff: on the newshour online: almost everyone makes one big mistake when negotiating higher salary, says jobs guru nick corcodilos. but there's a surefire way to elegantly open that conversation with potential employers: if you want more money, you have to prove why you're worth more, he says. on our making sense page, he explains how to do that. all that and more is on our website: pbs.org/newshour. i think eve made that mistake and i'm looking for the elegant solution, so i'll be logging on.

and that's the newshour for tonight. on thursday: an inside look at the fight to take down the islamic state in syria. i'm gwen ifill. >> woodruff: and i'm judy woodruff. join us online and again here tomorrow evening. for all of us at the pbs newshour, thank you and good night. >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by: ♪ >> supporting social entrepreneurs and their solutions to the world's most pressing problems-- skollfoundation.org. >> and with the ongoing support of these institutions and individuals. >> this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting. and by contributions to your pbs

station from viewers like you. thank you. captioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc captioned by media access group at wgbh access.wgbh.org

this is "nightly business report" with tyler mathisen and sue herera. >> stocks stage a comeback. is it all part of a bigger correction many have been calling for? >> change in taste. if shoppers aren't spending as much at macy's, what are they buying? >> cuba. the one thing standing in the way of google getting the island nation online. all that and more tonight on "nightly business report" for wednesday, august 12th. >> good evening, everyone. thank you for joining us. it could have been worse, a lot worse. after the dow dropped close to 300 points this morning on concerns of china's economic situation, the selling abruptly stopped. the buying kicked in and the major indexes staged a major reversal. by the closing bell, the dow