Personalities
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Yukio Mishima *I 14 1925 — The Live You Give
Mishima Yukio, born Hiraoka Kimitake, January 14 1925 in Tokyo, Japan, was a prolific writer who is regarded by many critics as the most important Japanese novelist of the 20th century. Mishima was the son of a high civil servant and attended the aristocratic Peers School in Tokyo. During World War II, having failed to…
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Morton Feldman *I 12 1926 — The Life You Give
Morton Feldman, born on January 12 1926, in New York, N.Y., U.S.A., was an avant-garde composer. He studied composition with Wallingford Riegger and Stefan Wolpe. In the 1950s, much more influenced by Abstract Expressionist painters than by other composers, he began using a method of graphic notation that included such devices as indicating the length…
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Blixa Bargeld *I 12 1959 — The Life You Give
A powerfully influential figure in experimental and avant-garde rock, Blixa Bargeld is best known as one of the founders of the pioneering industrial band Einstürzende Neubauten, as well as for his work with Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds. Blixa Bargeld was born Christian Emmerich in the Friedenau quarter of Berlin, Germany on January 12,…
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Eva Hesse *I 11 1936 — The Life You Give
Eva Hesse created innovative sculptural forms using unconventional materials such as latex and fiberglass and gave minimal art organic, emotional, and kinetic features. She scorned good taste and the decorative, creating sculptures out of repeated units which embodied opposite extremes. These extremes were born from the extremes of her own life. Hesse is recognized as…
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Sherrill Milnes *I 10 1935 — The Life You Give
Sherrill Milnes was born on January 10, 1935, and grew up on a dairy farm in Downers Grove, Illinois. Despite a childhood devoted to daily chores, he took voice lessons and studied piano, violin, viola, double bass, clarinet, and tuba. But when it came time for college, he pursued pre-medical studies. After a year and…
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Rod Stewart *I 10 1945 — The Life You Give
Over the course of his career, Rod Stewart has been lauded as the finest singer of his generation; he’s written several songs that turned into modern standards; he’s sung with the Faces, who rivaled the Rolling Stones in their prime; and he’s had massive commercial success. He’s one of rock & roll’s best interpretive singers…
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Waltraud Meier *I 9 1956 — The Life You Give
Though she has achieved much acclaim for her Wagnerian roles — and rightly so, mezzo-soprano Waltraud Meier possesses a vast repertory — not to mention a consummate skill — in Italian, French, and even Russian opera, from Bizet’s Carmen and Tchaikovsky’s Jeanne d’Arc to Verdi’s Azucena (Il Trovatore) and Saint-Saëns’ Dalila (Samson and Dalila). She…
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Ousmane Sembene *I 1 (or 8) 1923 – The Life You Give
Ousmane Sembène, born on the 1st, possibly the 8th of January, 1923, in Ziguinchor-Casamance, Senegal, French West Africa, is the writer and film director known for his historical and political themes. Sembène spent his early years as a fisherman on the Casamance coast. He studied at the School of Ceramics at Marsassoum and then moved…
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Giacinto Scelsi *I 8 1905 — The Life You Give
Giacinto Scelsi was born on January 8th, 1905 to an aristocratic family living on an old estate in the country surrounding Naples in southern Italy. Though he had little formal musical training, he is now recognized as one of the most creative composers of our century. Scelsi’s mature music is marked by a supreme concentration…
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David Bowie *I 8 1947 — The Life You Give
David Bowie, born David Jones on January 8 1947, in London, England, is the singer, songwriter, and actor who was most prominent in the 1970s and best known for his shifting personae and musical genre hopping. To call Bowie a transitional figure in rock history is less a judgment than a job description. Every niche…
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Rowan Atkinson *I 6 1955 — The Life You Give
Rowan Atkinson, born Rowan Sebastian Atkinson on born January 6 1955, in Newcastle upon Tyne, England, is the actor and comedian who delighted television and film audiences with his comic creation Mr. Bean. Atkinson, the son of wealthy Durham farmers, attended Durham Cathedral Choristers’ School. At the University of Newcastle upon Tyne he studied electrical…
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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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Alfred Brendel *I 5 1931 — The Life You Give
Alfred Brendel, born January 5, 1931, in Wiesenberg, Czechoslovakia [now Loučná nad Desnou, Czech Republic], is a pianist and writer whose recordings and international concert appearances secured his reputation. He is best known for his interpretations of Ludwig van Beethoven’s music, recording several cycles of the composer’s piano sonatas and concertos. Brendel studied the piano…
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Nikolai Medtner *I 4 1880 — The Life You Give
Russian composer Nikolai Karlovich Medtner (or Metner) was born January 4 1880 in Moscow, to parents of German descent who had lived in Russia for several generations. The family background was musical; his mother’s brother was Fedor Gedike (Theodore Goedicke), a minor Romantic composer and professional pianist. He received early piano lessons from his mother…
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Isaac Newton *I 4 1643 — The Life You Give
Isaac Newton, born January 4, 1643 [New Style], in Woolsthorpe, Lincolnshire, England, is the physicist and mathematician who was the culminating figure of the Scientific Revolution of the 17th century. In optics, his discovery of the composition of white light integrated the phenomena of colours into the science of light and laid the foundation for…
Sila Blume 