Breathing Curiosity
Johann Sebastian Bach, born March 21 [March 31, New Style], 1685, in Eisenach, Thuringia, Ernestine Saxon Duchies [Germany], was a composer of the Baroque era, the most celebrated member of a large family of north German musicians. Although he was admired by his contemporaries primarily as an outstanding harpsichordist, organist, and expert on organ building,… Continue reading Johann Sebastian Bach *III 21 1685 — The Life You Give
On a day like today, some significant humans arrived planet earth. 1685 Johann Sebastian Bach, the incomparable German composer and musician, in Eisenach, Germany. 1856 Henry Ossian Flipper, the USAmerican soldier who was the first US African American to graduate from West Point, after having been a slave, born in Thomasville, Georgia. 1931 Rolando Eliezer,… Continue reading To my Father, and Johann Sebastian Bach — especially
Christa Ludwig was one of the most admired mezzo-sopranos of her generation, with a wide repertoire of both lieder and opera. She brought a fine sense of musicianship as well as drama to her performances. Her roles ranged from Dorabella in Così fan Tutte to Brangane in Tristan und Isolde and Clytemnestra in Elektra, and… Continue reading Christa Ludwig *III 16 1928 — The Life You Give
Johann Strauss I, born March 14, 1804, Vienna, is one of the principal composers of Viennese waltzes.Strauss became a viola player in the dance orchestra of Michael Pamer, a composer of light music. Later he conducted the orchestra of Josef Lanner and in 1826 performed at the gardens of the “Zwei Tauben” the Täuberl-walzer, the… Continue reading Johann Strauss *III 14 1804 — The Life You Give
Bedřich Smetana, born March 2, 1824, in Leitomischl, Bohemia, Austrian Empire [now Litomyšl, Czech Republic], was composer of operas and symphonic poems, and founder of the Czech national school of music. He was the first truly important Bohemian nationalist composer.Smetana studied music under his father, an amateur violinist. He early took up piano under a… Continue reading Bedřich Smetana *III 2 1824 — The Life You Give
Gioachino Rossini, born Gioachino Antonio Rossini, on February 29 1792, in Pesaro, Papal States [Italy], is the composer noted for his operas, particularly his comic operas, of which The Barber of Seville (1816), Cinderella (1817), and Semiramide (1823) are among the best known. Of his later, larger-scale dramatic operas, the most widely heard is William… Continue reading Gioachino Rossini *February 29 1792 — The Life You Give
George Frideric Handel, German (until 1715) Georg Friedrich Händel, Händel also spelled Haendel, (born February 23, 1685, Halle, Brandenburg [Germany]—died April 14, 1759, London, England), German-born English composer of the late Baroque era, noted particularly for his operas, oratorios, and instrumental compositions. He wrote the most famous of all oratorios, Messiah (1741), and is also… Continue reading Georg Friedrich Händel *II 23 1685 — The Life You Give
Toni Morrison, born Chloe Anthony Wofford on February 18 1931, in Lorain, Ohio, U.S.A., was the writer noted for her examination of Black experience (particularly Black female experience) within the Black community. She received the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1993.Morrison grew up in the American Midwest in a family that possessed an intense love… Continue reading Toni Morrison *II 18 1931 — The Live You Give
Renée Fleming, born February 14 1959, in Indiana, Pennsylvania, U.S.A., is the soprano noted for the beauty and richness of her voice and for the thought and sensitivity she brought to the texts. Fleming’s repertoire was extraordinarily broad, spanning three centuries and ranging from Handel and Mozart through 19th-century bel canto to the works of… Continue reading Renée Fleming *II 14 1959 — The Life You Give
There is a complex, dotted, and cloudy line that divides or unites an individual in two. I am referring to what seems to be two sources and periods in the life of Peter Gabriel, as I see, hear, and think about his music. One Gabriel is the period during his work as front man to… Continue reading Peter Gabriel *II 13 1950 — The Life You Give
I am a simple man but for decades have understood my many privileges. Amongst many others, I have had the privilege of undergoing a second formative period, one with a level of intensity which has consistently allowed me to live life on a different plane than that of an average animal. Formative because well over… Continue reading Gerhard Richter *II 9 1932 — The Live 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… Continue reading Felix Mendelssohn *II 3 1809 — The Life You Give
James Joyce, born James Augustine Aloysius Joyce, on February 2, 1882, Dublin, Ireland, was the novelist noted for his experimental use of language and exploration of new literary methods in such large works of fiction as Ulysses (1922) and Finnegans Wake (1939). Early life Joyce, the eldest of 10 children in his family to survive… Continue reading James Joyce *II 2 1882 — The Life You Give
Renata Tebaldi, born February 1, 1922, in Pesaro, Italy, was an operatic soprano, a star at both Milan’s La Scala and New York City’s Metropolitan Opera. Tebaldi received her early musical training from her mother, a singer, and studied at the Parma Conservatory. At age 18 she sang for Carmen Melis, of the Arrigo Boito… Continue reading Renata Tebaldi *II 1 1922 — The Life You Give
Franz Schubert, born Franz Peter Schubert on January 31, 1797, in Himmelpfortgrund, near Vienna, Austria, is the composer who bridged the worlds of Classical and Romantic music, noted for the melody and harmony in his songs (lieder) and chamber music. Among other works are Symphony No. 9 in C Major (The Great; 1828), Symphony in… Continue reading Franz Schubert *I 31 1797 — The Life You Give
No other composer, no public figure has ever played consequential roles in my life like Phillip Glass. It all began with a physical, mental, perhaps even spiritual shock in 1982, when I sat in Carnegie Hall and experienced his music for the first time. That year I moved to Boston, where, not long after that,… Continue reading Philip Glass *I 31 1937 — 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… Continue reading Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart *I 27 1756 — The Life You Give
Her story is one of the most legendary of all twentieth century musicians' stories, and also, one of the most tragic. Cellist Jacqueline Du Pré, born on January 26, 1945, in Oxford, England, to Derek and Iris Du Pré. (Despite the family name, Derek Du Pré was not French, but rather of British Channel Island… Continue reading Jacqueline du Pré *I 26 1945 — The Life You Give
Anita Baker, born January 26, 1958, Toledo, Ohio, U.S.A., is the singer whose three-octave range and powerful, emotional delivery brought her international acclaim in the 1980s and ’90s. She was one of the most popular artists in urban contemporary music, a genre that her sophisticated, tradition-oriented soul and rhythm-and-blues singing helped to define. The Aristipposian… Continue reading Anita Baker *I 26 1958 — The Life You Give
Few of rock & roll's great misanthropes were as talented, as charming, or as committed to their cynicism as Warren Zevon. A singer and songwriter whose music often dealt with outlaws, mercenaries, sociopaths, and villains of all stripes, Zevon's lyrics displayed a keen and ready wit despite their often uncomfortable narrative circumstances, and while he… Continue reading Warren Zevon *I 24 1947 — The Life You Give
A Brief History of Penmanship on National Handwriting Day By JENNIE COHENUpdated AUG 22, 2018 / original: JAN 23, 2012 Borrowing aspects of the Etruscan alphabet, the ancient Romans were among the first to develop a written script for transactions and correspondence. By the fifth century A.D. it included early versions of lowercase letters and… Continue reading A Handwriting Celebration
Sila Blume 