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Jon Vickers *X 29 1926 — The Life You Give
While Jon Vickers was best known as a Wagnerian heldentenor, he was also capable of singing lieder, baroque opera, spinto Italian roles, and even the comic role of Vasek in The Bartered Bride. His voice and physique both radiated power, and his stage presence was one of the most impressive of his era. Like many…
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Francis Bacon *X 28 1909 — The Life You Give
Francis Bacon, born October 28, 1909, Dublin, Ireland, is the painter whose powerful, predominantly figural images express isolation, brutality, and terror. The son of a racehorse trainer, Bacon was educated mostly by private tutors at home until his parents banished him at age 16, allegedly for pursuing his homosexual leanings. Self-taught as an artist, he…
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Niccolò Paganini *X 27 1782 — The Life You Give
Niccolò Paganini, born October 27, 1782, in Genoa, republic of Genoa [Italy], is the composer and principal violin virtuoso of the 19th century. A popular idol, he inspired the Romantic mystique of the virtuoso and revolutionized violin technique. After initial study with his father, Paganini studied with a local violinist, G. Servetto, and then with…
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Conlon Nancarrow *X 27 1912 — The Life You Give
Conlon Nancarrow was an iconoclastic American composer who wrote in an utterly new way using new instrumental resources. While isolated from the main currents of music, he was virtually ignored by the public and his colleagues until the 1970s. In the 1980s composer György Ligeti said Nancarrow was writing “the best music by any living…
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Johann Strauss II *X 25 1825 The Life You Give
Johann Strauss II, born October 25, 1825, Vienna, Austria, “the Waltz King,” is the composer famous for his Viennese waltzes and operettas. Strauss was the eldest son of the composer Johann Strauss I. Because his father wished him to follow a nonmusical profession, he started his career as a bank clerk. He studied the violin…
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Sofia Gubaidulina *X 24 1931 — The Life You Give
Sofia Gubaidulina, born October 24, 1931, Chistopol, Tatar Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic [now Tatarstan, Russia]), is the composer whose works fuse Russian and Central Asian regional styles with the Western classical tradition. During her youth, Gubaidulina studied music in the city of Kazan, the capital of her home republic. She had lessons at the Kazan…
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Luciano Berio *X 24 1925 — The Life You Give
Luciano Berio, born October 24, 1925, in Oneglia, Italy, is the musician, whose success as theorist, conductor, composer, and teacher placed him among the leading representatives of the musical avant-garde. His style is notable for combining lyric and expressive musical qualities with the most advanced techniques of electronic and aleatory music. Berio studied composing and…
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pinna this!
pinna – noun pin·na | \ ˈpi-nə \plural pinnae\ ˈpi-ˌnē, -ˌnī \ or pinnas• a projecting body part (such as a feather, wing, or fin)• the largely cartilaginous projecting portion of the external ear• conducive to the inner ear, in which, with the judgment of other body parts — in flesh and beyond it —…
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Pelé *X 23 1940 The Life You Give
Pelé, born Edson Arantes do Nascimento, October 23, 1940, in Três Corações, Brazil, is the football (soccer) player, in his time probably the most famous and possibly the best-paid athlete in the world. He was part of the Brazilian national teams that won three World Cup championships (1958, 1962, and 1970). After playing for a…
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