classical music
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Leontyne Price *II 10 1927 — The Life You Give
Metropolitan Opera audiences began an extraordinary love affair with American soprano Leontyne Price immediately upon her debut on January 27, 1961. She was by then an internationally heralded singer and an experienced, refined musician and artist. But more than anything, it was the sheer beauty of her voice that excited her listeners. What they heard…
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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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Renata Tebaldi *II 1 1922 — 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…
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Philip Glass *I 31 1937 — 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,…
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Franz Schubert *I 31 1797 — 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…
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Days with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart: Don Giovanni
Music: Wolfgang Amadeus MozartLibretto: Lorenzo Da PonteACT ILeporello, servant to the nobleman Don Giovanni, keeps watch outside the Commendatore’s home at night. Suddenly, the Commendatore’s daughter, Donna Anna, rushes out, struggling with the masked Giovanni and followed by her father. The Commendatore challenges Giovanni to a duel and is killed. Giovanni and Leporello escape. Anna…
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Jacqueline du Pré *I 26 1945 — 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…
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“Elektra” (Strauss) premiered today in 1909
Music: Richard StraussLibretto: Hugo von HofmannsthalPremiere: 25 January 1909, Königliches Opernhaus, Dresden The courtyard of the Palace of Mycenae. The servants wonder whether Elektra will be grieving over her father, as is her daily ritual. Daughter of King Agamemnon and Klytämnestra, Elektra appears and locks herself up in solitude straight away. The servants all criticize…
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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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The Symphony: Jean Sibelius (1865-1957)
The 20th century Important symphonists of the early 20th century include many non-Germans. Carl Nielsen and Jean Sibelius, the former Danish, the latter Finnish, both owe much to the Viennese symphonists but acquired individual styles that resulted in new conceptions of symphonic form. Nielsen’s six symphonies display a kind of unity based on “progressive” or…
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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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Waltraud Meier: 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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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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Pablo Casals *XII 29 1876 — The Life You Give / La Vida Que Das
Pablo Casals, born Pau Casals i Defilló, on December 29, 1876, in Vendrell, Spain, was cellist and conductor, known for his virtuosic technique, skilled interpretation, and consummate musicianship. Biografía en español después de la foto Casals made his debut in Barcelona in 1891 after early training in composition, cello, and piano. After further study in…
Sila Blume 