Personalities
-
The Life You Give: Elisabeth Schwarzkopf *1915
Dame Elisabeth Schwarzkopf, born Dec. 9, 1915, in Jarotschin, near Posen, Germany, [now Poznań, Poland] was a soprano who performed in the major opera houses of the Western world and is remembered especially for her mastery of German songs known as lieder. Schwarzkopf studied at the Berlin High School for Music from 1934, winning various…
-
The Life You Give: Sammy Davis, Jr. *1925
Sammy Davis, Jr., born December 8, 1925 in New York, New York, was a singer, dancer, and entertainer. At age three Davis began performing in vaudeville with his father and uncle, Will Mastin, in the Will Mastin Trio. Davis studied tap dancing under Bill (“Bojangles”) Robinson but never received a formal education. After serving in…
-
The Life You Give: Tom Waits *1949
Tom Waits, born December 7, 1949, in Pomona, California, is a singer-songwriter and actor whose gritty, sometimes romantic depictions of the lives of the urban underclass won him a loyal if limited following and the admiration of critics and prominent musicians who performed and recorded his songs. Born into a middle-class California family but enamoured…
-
The Life You Give: Rainer Maria Rilke *1875
Rainer Maria Rilke, born December 4 1875, in Prague, Bohemia, Austria-Hungary [now in Czech Republic] was the poet who became internationally famous with such works as Duino Elegies and Sonnets to Orpheus. Rilke was the only son of a not-too-happy marriage. His father, Josef, a civil servant, was a man frustrated in his career; his…
-
The Life You Give: Jean-Luc Godard *1930
Jean-Luc Godard, born December 3, 1930, Paris, France, is a French Swiss film director who came to prominence with the New Wave group in France during the late 1950s and the ’60s. Early life and career Godard’s first feature film, À bout de souffle (1960; Breathless), which was produced by François Truffaut, his colleague on…
-
The Life You Give: Anton Maria von Webern *1883
Anton Webern — Anton Friedrich Wilhelm von Webern — born Dec. 3, 1883, in Vienna, Austria, was a composer of the 12-tone Viennese school. He is known especially for his passacaglia for orchestra, his chamber music, and various songs (Lieder). Life and works Webern’s father, a mining engineer, rose to the highest rank of his…
-
The Life You Give: Maria Callas *1923
Maria Callas, original name Maria Cecilia Sophia Anna Kalogeropoulos, born December 2, 1923, New York, New York, was an American-born Greek operatic soprano who revived classical coloratura roles in the mid-20th century with her lyrical and dramatic versatility. Callas was the daughter of Greek immigrants and early developed an interest in singing. Accompanied by her…
-
David Payne — C. S. Lewis: My Life’s Journey
Join us in a few minutes, in Celebration of C. S. Lewis. David Payne acts in an entertaining and informative play, the Life’s Journey of C. S. Lewis. At the Aristipposian Poet Club November 29 at 11:30pm ESTon Clubhouse
-
The Life You Give: Gaetano Donizetti *1797
Gaetano Donizetti, born on Nov. 29, 1797, in Bergamo, Cisalpine Republic, was an Italian opera composer whose numerous operas in both Italian and French represent a transitional stage in operatic development between Rossini and Verdi. Among his major works are Lucia di Lammermoor (1835), La fille du régiment (1840), and La favorite (1840). In his…
-
Are you experienced?
Not stoned but beautiful (Jimi Hendrix *November 27 1942)
-
The Life You Give: William Blake! *1757
William Blake, born Nov. 28, 1757, in London, England, was engraver, artist, poet, and visionary, author of exquisite lyrics in Songs of Innocence (1789) and Songs of Experience (1794) and profound and difficult “prophecies,” such as Visions of the Daughters of Albion (1793), The First Book of Urizen (1794), Milton (1804[–?11]), and Jerusalem (1804[–?20]). These…
-
The Life You Give: Stefan Zweig *1881
Stefan Zweig, born November 28, 1881, in Vienna, Austro-Hungarian Empire [now in Austria] was a writer who achieved distinction in several genres — poetry, essays, short stories, and dramas — most notably in his interpretations of imaginary and historical characters. Zweig was raised in Vienna. His first book, a volume of poetry, was published in…
-
The Life You Give: Jimi Hendrix *Nov 27 1942
Though his active career as a featured artist lasted a mere four years, Hendrix altered the course of popular music and became one of the most successful and influential musicians of his era. An instrumentalist who radically redefined the expressive potential and sonic palette of the electric guitar, he was the composer of a classic…
-
The Life You Give: Helmut Lachenmann *1935
“Expression is created on the reverse face of that on which the composer is working…destruction, deflation, and disintegration. But during this process expressive energy radiates out in the first instance like a creative serenity — freedom even.” — Helmut Lachenmann Join us listening to his compositionsat 11pm EST, November 27, at The Aristipposian Poet, on…
-
The Life You Give: Tina Turner *1939
Tina Turner, original name Anna Mae Bullock, (born November 26, 1939, Brownsville, Tennessee, U.S.), American-born singer who found success in the rhythm-and-blues, soul, and rock genres in a career that spanned five decades. Turner was born into a sharecropping family in rural Tennessee. She began singing as a teenager and, after moving to St. Louis,…
Sila Blume 