Orchestra
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Alban Berg *II 9 1885 — The Life You Give
Alban Berg, born Alban Maria Johannes Berg, on February 9 1885, in Vienna, Austria, is the composer who wrote atonal and 12-tone compositions that remained true to late 19th-century Romanticism. He composed orchestral music (including Five Orchestral Songs, 1912), chamber music, songs, and two groundbreaking operas, Wozzeck (1925) and Lulu (1937). Apart from a few…
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Felix Mendelssohn *II 3 1809 — The Life You Give
Felix Mendelssohn, born Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, on February 3 1809, in Hamburg, Germany, is, as composer, pianist, musical conductor, and teacher, one of the most-celebrated figures of the early Romantic period. In his music Mendelssohn largely observed Classical models and practices while initiating key aspects of Romanticism—the artistic movement that exalted feeling and the…
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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart *I 27 1756 — The Life You Give
Johann Chrysostom Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, baptized as Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, born January 27, 1756, in Salzburg, is the composer widely recognized as one of the greatest composers in the history of Western music. With Haydn and Beethoven he brought to its height the achievement of the Viennese Classical school. Unlike any other composer…
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Witold Lutosławski *I 25 1913 — The Life You Give
Lutoslawski was the leading progressive figure in Polish music of the second half of the twentieth century. Born in Warsaw, he showed an exceptional musical talent at an early age, with his first compositions dating from 1922. He studied piano, violin, and composition (with Witold Maliszewski, a pupil of Rimsky-Korsakov), graduating from the Warsaw Conservatory…
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Aleksandr Scriabin *I 6 1871 — The Life You Give
Aleksandr Scriabin, born Aleksandr Nikolayevich Scriabin, on Jan. 6, 1872, in Moscow, Russia, was a composer of piano and orchestral music noted for its unusual harmonies through which the composer sought to explore musical symbolism. Scriabin was trained as a soldier at the Moscow Cadet School from 1882 to 1889 but studied music at the…
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Ludwig van Beethoven *XII 17 1770 — The Life You Give
Ludwig van Beethoven, born on December 17, 1770, in Bonn, Germany, is the composer, and predominant musical figure in the transitional period between the Classical and Romantic eras. Widely regarded as the greatest composer who ever lived, Ludwig van Beethoven dominates a period of musical history as no one else before or since. Rooted in…
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Hector Berlioz *XII 11 1803 — The Life You Give
Hector Berlioz, born Louis-Hector Berlioz on December 11, 1803, in La Côte-Saint-André, France, is the composer, critic, and conductor of the Romantic period, known largely for his Symphonie fantastique (1830), the choral symphony Roméo et Juliette (1839), and the dramatic piece La Damnation de Faust (1846). His last years were marked by fame abroad and…
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Olivier Messiaen *XII 10 1908 — The Life You Give
Olivier Messiaen, born Olivier-Eugène-Prosper-Charles Messiaen, December 10, 1908, in Avignon, France, is the influential composer, organist, and teacher noted for his use of mystical and religious themes. As a composer he developed a highly personal style noted for its rhythmic complexity, rich tonal colour, and unique harmonic language. Messiaen was the son of Pierre Messiaen,…
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Alfred Schnittke *XI 24 1934 — The Life you Give
Alfred Schnittke, born Nov. 24, 1934, Engels, Volga German Autonomous S.S.R. [now in Saratov oblast, Russia], is the postmodernist Russian composer who created serious, dark-toned musical works characterized by abrupt juxtapositions of radically different, often contradictory, styles, an approach that came to be known as “polystylism.” Schnittke’s father was a Jewish journalist who had been…
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Krzysztof Penderecki *XI 23 1933 — The Life You Give
Krzysztof Penderecki, born November 23, 1933, in Debica, Poland, is an outstanding composer of his generation whose novel and masterful treatment of orchestration won worldwide acclaim. Penderecki studied composition at the Superior School of Music in Kraków (graduated 1958) and subsequently became a professor there. He first drew attention in 1959 at the third Warsaw…
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Manuel de Falla *XI 23 1876 — La Vida Que Das / The Life You Give
See English biography at the bottom Manuel de Falla Matheu, nacido en Cádiz, el 23 de Noviembre del 1876, es el compositor y la figura musical más trascendente de todo el siglo xx español, tanto por la importancia de sus obras como por las secuelas que su trabajo ha creado en generaciones posteriores. Es el…
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Benjamin Britten *XI 22 1913 — The Life You Give
Benjamin Britten, born Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten Of Aldeburgh, November 22, 1913, in Lowestoft, Suffolk, England, is the composer of the mid-20th century, whose operas were considered the finest English operas since those of Henry Purcell in the 17th century. He was also an outstanding pianist and conductor. Britten composed as a child and…
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Meredith Monk *XI 20 1942 — The Life You Give
Meredith Monk, born Meredith Jane Monk, November 20, 1942, New York City, New York, U.S.A., is the performance artist, a pioneer in the avant-garde, whose work skillfully integrated diverse performance disciplines and media. Monk studied piano and eurythmics from an early age. She earned a B.A. in 1964 from Sarah Lawrence College, Bronxville, New York.…
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Paul Hindemith *XI 16 1895 — The Life You Give
Paul Hindemith, born November 16, 1895, in Hanau, near Frankfurt am Main, Germany, is the one of the principal German composers of the first half of the 20th century and a leading musical theorist. He sought to revitalize tonality—the traditional harmonic system that was being challenged by many other composers—and also pioneered in the writing…
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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…
Sila Blume 