Heidi's Music Studio

January Composer

2012-01-06T08:54:00.000-08:00

Ludwig van Beethoven baptized 17 December 1770^[1] – 26 March 1827) was a German^[2] composer and pianist. A crucial figure in the transition between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western art music, he remains one of the most famous and influential of all composers.
Born in Bonn, then the capital of the Electorate of Cologne and part of the Holy Roman Empire, Beethoven moved to Vienna in his early 20s, studying with Joseph Haydn and quickly gaining a reputation as a virtuoso pianist. His hearing began to deteriorate in his late twenties, yet he continued to compose, conduct, and perform, even after becoming completely deaf.

December Composer

2011-12-01T04:32:00.000-08:00

Jean Sibelius 8 December 1865 – 20 September 1957) was a Finnish composer of the later Romantic period whose music played an important role in the formation of the Finnish national identity. His mastery of the orchestra has been described as "prodigious."^[1]
The core of Sibelius's oeuvre is his set of seven symphonies. Like Beethoven, Sibelius used each successive work to further develop his own personal compositional style. His works continue to be performed frequently in the concert hall and are often recorded.
In addition to the symphonies, Sibelius's best-known compositions include Finlandia, the Karelia Suite, Valse triste, the Violin Concerto in D minor and The Swan of Tuonela (one of the four movements of the Lemminkäinen Suite). Other works include pieces inspired by the Finnish national epic, the Kalevala; over 100 songs for voice and piano; incidental music for 13 plays; the opera Jungfrun i tornet (The Maiden in the Tower); chamber music; piano music; Masonic ritual music; and 21 separate publications of choral music.
Sibelius composed prolifically until the mid-1920s. However, after completing his Seventh Symphony (1924), the incidental music to The Tempest (1926), and the tone poem Tapiola (1926), he produced no large scale works for the remaining thirty years of his life. Although he is reputed to have stopped composing, he in fact attempted to continue writing, including abortive efforts to compose an eighth symphony. He wrote some Masonic music and re-edited some earlier works during this last period of his life, and retained an active interest in new developments in music, although he did not always view modern music favorably.
The Finnish 100 mark bill featured his image until it was taken out of circulation in 2002

November Composer

2011-11-01T04:29:00.000-07:00

Francesca Lebrun, née Danzi (March 24, 1756 – May 14, 1791), was a noted 18th-century German singer and composer.
She was born Franziska Dorothea Danzi in Mannheim, Germany. Her father was the Italian-born cellist Innocenz Danzi and her younger brother was the composer and cellist Franz Danzi (1763–1826). She was renowned for her vocal dexterity and highly sought after by notable contemporaries, such as Schweitzer, Holzbauer, and Salieri, for the lead roles in their most challenging opuses.
Her talent extended beyond the stage to the manuscript tablet and the keyboard; twelve sonatas for fortepiano and violin of hers survive, six of which have been recorded.

October Composer

2011-10-01T04:27:00.000-07:00

Joseph-Maurice Ravel (March 7, 1875 – December 28, 1937) was a French composer known especially for his melodies, orchestral and instrumental textures and effects. Much of his piano music, chamber music, vocal music and orchestral music has entered the standard concert repertoire.
Ravel's piano compositions, such as Jeux d'eau, Miroirs, Le tombeau de Couperin and Gaspard de la nuit, demand considerable virtuosity from the performer, and his orchestral music, including Daphnis et Chloé and his arrangement of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition, uses a variety of sound and instrumentation.
Ravel is perhaps known best for his orchestral work Boléro (1928), which he considered trivial and once described as "a piece for orchestra without music".

September Composer

2011-09-05T21:27:00.000-07:00

James Sylvester Scott (February 12, 1885 – August 30, 1938) was an African-American ragtime composer, regarded as one of the three most important composers of classic ragtime, along with Scott Joplin and Joseph Lamb.^[1]
He was born in Neosho, Missouri to James Scott Sr. and Molly Thomas Scott, both former slaves. In 1901 his family moved to Carthage, Missouri, where he attended Lincoln High School. In 1902 he began working at the music store of Charles L. Dumars, first at menial labor, but before long demonstrating music at the piano, including his own pieces. Demand for his music convinced Dumars to print the first of Scott's published compositions, "A Summer Breeze", in 1903.^[1]
In 1906 he moved to St. Louis, Missouri, where Scott Joplin introduced him to publisher John Stillwell Stark. The first Scott rag that Stark published, "Frog Legs Rag", became a hit, and Scott became a regular contributor to the Stark catalogue. In 1914 Scott moved to Kansas City, Missouri, where he married Nora Johnson, taught music, and accompanied silent movies.^[1]^[2]

With the arrival of sound movies, his fortunes declined. He lost his theater work, his wife died without child, and his health deteriorated.^[2] Though it is said he continued to compose, he published nothing after Stark's retirement in 1922. He died in Kansas City, Kansas and was buried there in the Westlawn Cemetery.
Scott's best-known compositions include "Climax Rag", "Frog Legs Rag", "Grace and Beauty", "Ophelia Rag" and "The Ragtime Oriole".
Scott was a cousin of blues singer Ada Brown.^[1]

August Composer

2011-07-31T23:08:00.000-07:00

Johann Christian Bach (September 5, 1735 – January 1, 1782) was a composer of the Classical era, the eleventh and youngest son of Johann Sebastian Bach. He is sometimes referred to as 'the London Bach' or 'the English Bach', due to his time spent living in the British capital. He is noted for influencing the concerto style of Mozart.

Johann Christian Bach was born to Johann Sebastian and Anna Magdalena Bach in Leipzig, Germany. His distinguished father was already 50 at the time of his birth, which would perhaps contribute to the sharp differences between his music and that of his father. Even so, his father first instructed him in music and that instruction continued until his death. After his father's death, when Johann Christian was 15, he worked with his second-oldest half brother Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach, who was twenty-one years his senior and considered at the time to be the most musically gifted of Bach's sons.

He enjoyed a promising career, first as a composer then as a performer playing alongside Carl Friedrich Abel, the notable player of the viola da gamba. He composed cantatas, chamber music, keyboard and orchestral works, operas and symphonies.
Bach lived in Italy for many years starting in 1756, studying with Padre Martini in Bologna. He became organist at the Milan cathedral in 1760. During his time in Italy, he converted from Lutheranism to Catholicism. In 1762, Bach travelled to London to première three operas at the King's Theatre, including Orione on 19 February 1763. That established his reputation in England, and he became music master to Queen Charlotte. He met soprano Cecilia Grassi in 1766 and married her shortly thereafter. She was his junior by eleven years. They had no children.

Johann Christian Bach died in London on New Year's Day, 1782. He was buried in the St. Pancras Old Church graveyard, St Pancras, London.

July Composer

2011-06-30T23:05:00.000-07:00

Thelonious Sphere Monk[2] (October 10, 1917[3] – February 17, 1982) was an American jazz pianist and composer considered "one of the giants of American music".[4] Monk had a unique improvisational style and made numerous contributions to the standard jazz repertoire, including "Epistrophy", "'Round Midnight", "Blue Monk", "Straight, No Chaser" and "Well, You Needn't". Monk is the second most recorded jazz composer after Duke Ellington, which is particularly remarkable as Ellington composed over 1,000 songs while Monk wrote about 70.[5]

Often regarded as a founder of bebop, Monk's playing later evolved away from that style. His compositions and improvisations are full of dissonant harmonies and angular melodic twists, and are consistent with Monk's unorthodox approach to the piano, which combined a highly percussive attack with abrupt, dramatic use of silences and hesitations.

Monk's manner was idiosyncratic. Visually, he was renowned for his distinctive style in suits, hats and sunglasses. He was also noted for the fact that at times, while the other musicians in the band continued playing, he would stop, stand up from the keyboard and dance for a few moments before returning to the piano. One of his regular dances consisted of continuously turning clockwise, which has drawn comparisons to ring-shout and Sufi whirling.

He is one[6] of five jazz musicians to have been featured on the cover of Time (the other four being Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Wynton Marsalis, and Dave Brubeck) as of 2010.[7]

June Composer

2011-05-31T17:04:00.000-07:00

Joseph Lamb, ca. 1915

"Sensation", Joseph Lamb's first rag published under John Stark's label.

"The Top Liner Rag", from 1916.Joseph Francis Lamb (December 6, 1887 – September 3, 1960) was a noted American composer of ragtime music. Lamb, of Irish descent, was the only non-African American of the "Big Three" composers of classical ragtime, the other two being Scott Joplin and James Scott.

Life and CareerLamb was born in Montclair, New Jersey. The youngest of four children, he taught himself to play the piano, and was very taken with the early ragtime publications of Scott Joplin. He dropped out of St. Jerome's College in 1904 to work for a dry goods company. In 1907 Lamb was purchasing the latest Joplin and James Scott sheet music in the New York City offices of John Stark & Son when he met his idol Joplin. Joplin was favorably impressed with Lamb's compositions, and recommended him to classical ragtime publisher John Stark. Stark published Lamb's music for the next decade, starting with "Sensation".

Lamb’s twelve rags published by Stark from 1908 to 1919 can be divided into two groups. A) The “heavy” rags which are incorporated with Scott Joplin’s melody –dominated style and James Scott’s expansive use of the keyboard registers. This style of rags includes

• "Ethiopia Rag" (1909)
• "Excelsior Rag" (1909)
• "American Beauty Rag" (1913)
• "Ragtime Nightingale" (1915)
• "The Top Liner Rag" (1916)

B) The “light” rags which have the cakewalk tradition show the narrow-range melodies inspired by Joplin. This style of rags includes
• "Champagne Rag" (1910)
• "Cleopatra Rag" (1915)
• "Reindeer : Ragtime Two Step" (1915)
• "Bohemia Rag" (1919)
"Contentment Rag" (1915) and "Patricia Rag" (1916) have both characteristics of “heavy” rags and “light” rags.

Lamb’s works show individual stylistic traits. First, he uses sequence for development purposes. Second, he emphasizes on the harmonic sonority of the diminished seventh with upper-neighbor appoggiatura. His contributions to the ragtime literature also show his unique traits. He used a great diversity of texture for all of his rags. In addition, Lamb surpassed ragtime’s usual four-measure phrase structure.[1]

In 1911, Lamb married Henrietta Schultz and moved to Brooklyn, New York. He worked as an arranger for the J. Fred Helf Music Publishing Company and later, starting in April 1914, as an accountant for L. F. Dommerich & Company.

Henrietta died of influenza in 1920, about the same time that popular music interest shifted from ragtime to jazz. Lamb stopped publishing his music, playing and composing only as a hobby. "Bohemia Rag" was the last Lamb rag published before his death in 1960. That same year, his album, Joseph Lamb: A Study in Classic Ragtime, was released by Folkways Records.[2]

With the revival of interest in ragtime in the 1950s, Lamb shared his memories of Joplin and other early ragtime figures with music historians. (Many were surprised to find that not only was he still living, but that he was white.) He also composed some new rags, brought out some of his old compositions that had never been published, and made some recordings.

Lamb died in Brooklyn of a heart attack at age 72.

May Composer

2011-05-01T01:57:00.000-07:00

Johann Baptist Cramer "drawn from Life & on Stone" by William SharpJohann Baptist Cramer (24 February 1771 – 16 April 1858) was an English musician of German origin. He was the son of Wilhelm Cramer, a famous London violinist and musical conductor, one of a numerous family who were identified with the progress of music during the 18th and 19th centuries.
Johann Baptist Cramer was born in Mannheim and was brought to London as a child, and it was in London that the greater part of his musical efforts was exercised.

From 1782 to 1784, he studied the piano under Muzio Clementi, and soon became known as a professional pianist both in London and on the continent. He enjoyed a worldwide reputation, and was particularly appreciated by Beethoven. He was the English publisher of Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5 and is credited with giving it its nickname, "The Emperor".[1] He died in London.

[edit] LegacyJohann Baptist Cramer was one of the most renowned piano performers of his day. He met Beethoven in Vienna, initiating a mutually rewarding relationship, and he renewed his friendly association with Haydn.

After 1800, Cramer's public career was centred almost entirely on England. Following the very successful example of Clementi, Cramer entered the music publishing business. The large volume of Cramer's composition is only part of his musical achievement: Beethoven considered him the finest pianist of the day.

Apart from his piano playing, Cramer is important as a composer. He established a musical instrument manufacturing and music-publishing outlet Cramer & Co. at 201 Regent Street[2]) in partnership with Thomas Frederick Beale and Robert Addison. Cramer ceased involvement with the business at the end of 1833, although it continued to carry his name[3]. He wrote a number of sonatas and other pieces for piano, and other compositions, but his studies are the works by which he lives on as a composer. These studies have appeared in numerous editions, and became the staple pieces in the training of pianists.

His music is generally less dramatic than Clementi's, less rich than Dussek's, and less sentimental than Field's. The originality of his genius appears principally in his combination of a conservative bias with the most advanced, idiomatically pianistic passage-work. He wrote about 200 solo piano sonatas, about 50 sonatas for instruments accompanied by piano, 9 piano concertos, and chamber music.

His brother Franz Cramer was Master of the King's Musick from 1837 until his death in 1848.

[edit] Selected worksPiano Concerto No. 2 in D minor, Op. 16

Grande sonate pour le piano-forte, Op. 20 (1809)[4]

Sonata in A-flat major for piano, Op. 23, No. 1

2 Sonatas for piano, Op. 27

1.in F major

2.-

Sonata in A-flat major for piano, Op. 46 ("Die Jungfrau von Orleans")

Piano Concerto No. 5 in C minor, Op. 48

Keyboard Sonata in A minor ("L'Ultima"), Op. 53 (1812)

Piano Concerto No. 7 in E major, Op. 56

Sonata for piano in C major, Op. 57

Keyboard Sonatas in B-flat major ("Les suivantes No. 2"), Op. 58 (1817) - Allegro spiritoso / Largo sostenuto / Rondo allegretto

Keyboard Sonata in E minor ("Les Suivante No. 3"), Op. 59 (1817)

Keyboard Sonata in E major ("Le Retour a Londres"), Op. 62 (1818)

Keyboard Sonata in D minor, Op. 63 (1821)

Introduzione ed aria all'inglese for piano, Op. 65

Piano Quintet in E major ("Amicitia"), Op. 69 (1824) - also in a piano arrangement

Piano Concerto No. 8 in D minor, Op. 70

Keyboard Sonata in F major ("Il Mezzo"), Op. 74 (1827)

Short Studies, Op. 100

Romance et Tarantelle Brilliante (Romance in F major - Tarantelle in A Minor), Op. 101

April Composer

2011-04-01T01:51:00.000-07:00

Fanny Hensel, 1842, by Moritz Daniel OppenheimFanny Cäcilie Mendelssohn (14 November 1805 – 14 May 1847), later Fanny Hensel, was a German pianist and composer, the sister of the composer Felix Mendelssohn and granddaughter of the philosopher Moses Mendelssohn. She was the grandmother of the philosopher Paul Hensel and the mathematician Kurt Hensel.
Fanny Mendelssohn, sketched by her future husband Wilhelm HenselFanny Mendelssohn was born in Hamburg, the oldest of four children. She was descended on both sides from distinguished Jewish families; her parents were Abraham Mendelssohn (who was the son of philosopher Moses Mendelssohn and later changed the family surname to Mendelssohn Bartholdy), and Lea, née Salomon, a granddaughter of the entrepreneur Daniel Itzig.

Like many women at that time, Fanny did not benefit from the same musical education and upbringing as her brother Felix. Felix enjoyed the opportunity of great music tutors, such as Carl Friedrich Zelter. Felix received much encouragement to compose, and make a career from music. Fanny, however, learned mostly on her own. The siblings did, however, both share a great passion for music. Like Felix (who was born in 1809), Fanny showed prodigious musical ability as a child and began to write music. Visitors to the Mendelssohn household in the early 1820s, including Ignaz Moscheles and Sir George Smart, were equally impressed by both siblings. She may also have been influenced by the role-models of her great-aunts Fanny von Arnstein and Sarah Levy, both lovers of music, the former the patroness of a well-known salon and the latter a skilled keyboard player in her own right. [1]

However, she was limited by prevailing attitudes of the time toward women, attitudes apparently shared by her father, who was tolerant, rather than supportive, of her activities as a composer. Her father wrote to her in 1820 "Music will perhaps become his [i.e. Felix's] profession, while for you it can and must be only an ornament". On the other hand, Felix was supportive of her, as a composer and a performer, although cautious (professedly for family reasons) of her publishing her works under her own name. He did however arrange with her for a number of her songs to be published under his own name. In turn Fanny helped Felix by constructive criticism of pieces, which he always considered very carefully.

In 1829, after a courtship of several years, Fanny married the painter Wilhelm Hensel and the following year she had her only child, Sebastian Ludwig Felix Hensel.[2]

Her husband was supportive of her composing. Subsequently, her works were often played alongside her brother's at the family home in Berlin in a sunday concert series (Sonntagskonzerte), which was originally organized by Fanny's father, and after 1831 carried on by Fanny herself. Her public debut at the piano (and only known public performance) came in 1838, when she played her brother's Piano Concerto No. 1. In 1846, she decided, without consulting Felix, to publish a collection of her songs (as her op. 1). [3]

Grave of Fanny Hensel in BerlinFanny Hensel died in Berlin in 1847 of complications from a stroke suffered while rehearsing one of her brother's oratorios, The First Walpurgis Night. Felix himself died less than six months later from the same cause (which was also responsible for the deaths of both of their parents and of their grandfather Moses)[4], but not before writing his String Quartet No. 6 in F minor in memory of his sister.

In recent years, her music has become better known thanks to concert performances and a number of CDs being released on labels such as Hyperion and CPO. Her reputation has also been advanced by those researching female musical creativity, of which she is one of the relatively few well-documented exemplars in the early 19th century.

MusicSee also List of compositions by Fanny Mendelssohn.

Fanny Mendelssohn composed 466 pieces of music. Her compositions include a piano trio and several books of solo piano pieces and songs. A number of her songs were originally published under Felix's name in his opus 8 and 9 collections. One of these songs, "Italy", was a favourite of Queen Victoria, who thought Felix had written it. Her piano works are often in the manner of songs, and many carry the name Lied ohne Worte (Song without Words). This style (and title) of piano music was most successfully developed by Felix Mendelssohn, though some modern scholars assert that Fanny may have preceded him in the genre.

She also wrote, amongst other works for the piano, a cycle of pieces depicting the months of the year, Das Jahr ("The Year").[5] The music was written on coloured sheets of paper, and illustrated by her husband Wilhelm . Each piece was also accompanied by a short poem.

March Composer

2011-03-02T13:51:00.000-08:00

Carl Czerny, lithograph by Josef Kriehuber, 1833Carl Czerny (German: [kaɹl ˈtʃɛrni]) (21 February 1791 – 15 July 1857) was an Austrian pianist, composer and teacher. He is best remembered today for his books of études for the piano. Czerny's music was profoundly influenced by his teachers, Muzio Clementi, Johann Nepomuk Hummel, Antonio Salieri and Ludwig van Beethoven.

Early lifeCarl Czerny was born in Vienna to a musical family of Czech origin. His grandfather was a violinist and his father was an oboist, organist, and pianist. His family came to Vienna from Nymburk, Bohemia and Carl himself did not speak German until the age of ten. A child prodigy, Czerny began playing piano at age three and composing at age seven. His first piano teacher was his father, Wenzel Czerny, who taught him mainly Bach, Mozart, and Clementi. Czerny began performing piano recitals in his parents' home. Beethoven, attending one such recital, was so impressed with Czerny's performance of his Pathétique Sonata that he took on the 10 year old as a student.[1] Czerny remained under Beethoven's tutelage for the next three years. Czerny went on to take lessons from Johann Nepomuk Hummel and Antonio Salieri. Czerny also attended courses which Muzio Clementi held in Paris, Vienna, St. Petersburg, Berlin, Prague, Rome and Milan.

Czerny made his first public performance in 1800 playing Mozart's Piano Concerto No. 24 in C minor. However, he was never confident in his abilities as a performer and resolved to withdraw permanently from the stage.[2] At age 21, in February 1812, he returned to the public to give the Vienna premiere of Beethoven's Piano Concerto No. 5, "Emperor".

TeachingAt age fifteen, Czerny began a very successful teaching career. Basing his method on the teaching of Beethoven and Clementi, Czerny taught up to twelve lessons a day in the homes of Viennese nobility.[1] His notable students included Sigismond Thalberg, Stephen Heller, Alfred Jaëll, Theodor Leschetizky, Theodor Kullak, Theodor Döhler, and Anna Caroline Oury.

His most famous student was Franz Liszt, who began studying with Czerny at age nine. Czerny was Liszt's only teacher. Upon taking him on as a student, Czerny forced Liszt to abandon all repertoire for the first few months, insisting he play only scales and exercises to strengthen his technique.

As a concert pianist, Liszt went on to include several Czerny compositions in his repertoire. Liszt also dedicated his twelve Transcendental Etudes to Czerny, who was among the first composers to pioneer the "etude" form. Liszt also collaborated with Czerny on the Hexaméron; a joint work along with fellow composers Frédéric Chopin, Sigismond Thalberg, Henri Herz, and Johann Peter Pixis.

CompositionCzerny composed a very large number of pieces (up to Op. 861), including a number of masses and requiems, and a large number of symphonies, concertos, sonatas and string quartets. Few of these pieces are played today. The enduring part of Czerny's repertoire is the large number of didactic piano pieces he wrote, such as The School of Velocity and The Art of Finger Dexterity. He was one of the first composers to use étude ("study") for a title.

Czerny's body of works also include arrangements for eight pianos, four hands each, of two overtures of Gioachino Rossini. He also left an essay on performing the piano sonatas of Beethoven. He published an autobiographical sketch, "Erinnerungen aus meinem Leben" (1842; "Memories from My Life").

On a minor note, Czerny was one of 50 composers who wrote a Variation on a theme of Anton Diabelli for Part II of the Vaterländischer Künstlerverein (published 1824). He also wrote a coda to round out the collection. Part I was devoted to the 33 variations supplied by Beethoven, which have gained an independent identity as his Diabelli Variations, Op. 120. Czerny maintained a relationship with Beethoven throughout his life, giving piano lessons to Beethoven's beloved nephew Carl, and proofreading many of Beethoven's works before they were published.[1]

DeathCzerny remained in Vienna for most of his life, only leaving three times (he visited Leipzig in 1836, Paris and London in 1837, and Lombardy in 1846).[2] He died in Vienna at the age of 66. He never married and he had no near relatives. Shortly before his death, he disposed of his considerable fortune with the help of his friend and lawyer Leopold von Sonnleithner.[2]

February Composer

2011-02-01T00:01:00.000-08:00

Franz Liszt

A Romantic icon and one of the first proponents of the orchestral tone poem, Franz Liszt was an unparalleled keyboard virtuoso and a supremely talented and innovative composer. He was also renowned as a mercurial personality and bandit of love; in short, like the flamboyant violinist Niccolo Paganini, Liszt lived the Romantic ideal to the hilt.

He was born in Hungary in 1811, and began to study the piano at the age of six. He exhibited unusual talent on the instrument, and gave a number of successful concerts while still a child. After continuing his piano studies with the help of Hungarian nobility, he moved with his family to Vienna, where he studied with Carl Czerny and the now-infamous Antonio Salieri. He made more concert appearances, and audiences took to his passionate and technically immaculate playing. Next was Paris, where, at the age of 16, he decided to take up long-term residence.

Liszt's fame as a piano virtuoso grew; in 1831 he was lucky enough to see the violinist Paganini in performance, and that experience (Paganini's gifts on the violin were so breathtaking that many people believed he was in league with the devil) made a profound impact on the young pianist; he resolved to apply Paganini's showmanship and pyrotechnics to the piano, and in so doing revolutionized the piano as a virtuosic instrument.

Liszt's life reads a bit like a chapter out of Don Juan. Flamboyant in dress and manner, he carried out innummerable minor love affairs and two major ones - first with the Countess Marie d'Agoult, and later with the Princess Carolyne von Sayn-Wittgenstein, who worked with him while he was Court Music Director at Weimar. At the age of 48, after living the high life for three decades, he suddenly entered the priesthood, thereafter splitting his musical activities between Rome, Weimar and Budapest; he was conferred the religious title of Abbé in 1866 by Pope Pius IX. Wherever he went, even in later years, he was surrounded by throngs of admirers, imitators and hangers-on.

One might think that all of this adulation and personality-worship would color Liszt's approach to the music that had vaulted him to such overwhelming fame. But this never happened; rather, Liszt always adhered strictly to his core musical values, and considered the directions of the composer the ultimate authority in interpretation. He revered composers from Beethoven to Berlioz to Wagner, and always tried to expand upon their work to create new musical forms. And he succeeded...his transcriptions of orchestral works for the piano (Schumann's Widmung, Verdi's Rigoletto and Aida, Beethoven's symphonies and Berlioz' Symphonie Fantastique are only a few) led to a completely new style of piano composition, and his orchestral tone poems, written mostly during his stint at Weimar, are revolutionary in their use of harmonic progression and programmatic elements.

Liszt is perhaps best-known, however, for his piano music, and much of it is utterly magnificent. His monumental one-movement Sonata in B minor (1853) is one of the masterpieces of instrumental solo music, and his numerous tone poems, showpieces and smaller works for piano are brilliant examples of a restless, Romantic imagination, informed but quite removed from the rigor of Classical forms.

January Composer

2010-12-29T10:56:00.000-08:00

Rachmaninoff, Sergey Vasilyevich (1873-1943), Russian-American composer, pianist, and conductor, one of the most brilliant pianists of the 20th century, whose compositions are considered the last major musical expression of the romantic era. Rachmaninoff was born on April 1, 1873, near Novgorod. In Moscow his piano teachers included the stringent disciplinarian Nikolay Zverov and Rachmaninoff's cousin Aleksandr Siloti, who gave him the heritage of his own teacher, the Hungarian pianist-composer Franz Liszt. There also, Rachmaninoff studied with three eminent Russian composers Anton Arensky, Sergey Taneyev, and his most important musical mentor, Peter Ilich Tchaikovsky.

Rachmaninoff's Prelude in C-sharp Minor (1892), for piano and orchestra, and his opera Aleko (1893) established his reputation as a composer. Also written in 1893 was his Trio élégiaque, in memory of Tchaikovsky. In 1897 his Symphony No. 1 in D Minor was performed. Its disastrous reception caused him to stop composing, and for three years he worked solely as a pianist and conductor. His Piano Concerto No. 2 in C Minor (1900) marked his return to composition. From the next 17 years come his Symphony No. 2 in E Minor (1906); the symphonic poem The Isle of the Dead (1909); the Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom (1910), for choir; the choral symphony The Bells (1913), based on a poem by the American writer Edgar Allan Poe; and many highly admired songs. Except for a period in Dresden, Germany (1906-8), he worked mainly in Moscow; in 1904-6 he conducted at the Bolshoi Theatre.

After leaving Russia in 1917, Rachmaninoff settled in the United States the following year. In exile he concentrated on his piano and conducting careers, making recordings in both fields. His few compositions after 1917 include the Variations on a Theme of Corelli (1934), for piano; Rhapsody on a Theme of Paganini (1936), for piano and orchestra; the Symphony No. 3 in A Minor (1936); and the Piano Concerto No. 4 in G Minor (1937). He died in Beverly Hills, California, on March 28, 1943.

December Composer

2010-12-01T03:14:00.000-08:00

Edward Alexander MacDowell (December 18, 1860[1] - January 23, 1908) was an American composer and pianist of the Romantic period. He was best known for his second piano concerto and his piano suites "Woodland Sketches", "Sea Pieces", and "New England Idylls". "Woodland Sketches" includes his most popular short piece, "To a Wild Rose". In 1904 he was one of the first seven Americans honored by membership in the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

November Composer

2010-11-01T03:13:00.000-07:00

Clara Schumann (née Clara Josephine Wieck; 13 September 1819 – 20 May 1896) was a German musician and composer, considered one of the most distinguished pianists of the Romantic era. She exerted her influence over a 61-year concert career, changing the format and repertoire of the piano recital and the tastes of the listening public. Her husband was the composer Robert Schumann. She and her husband encouraged Johannes Brahms, and she was the first pianist to give public performances of some of Brahms' works, notably the Variations and Fugue on a Theme by Handel.

October Composer

2010-10-01T03:11:00.000-07:00

Anton Diabelli (5 September 1781 – 8 April 1858) was an Austrian music publisher, editor and composer. Best known in his time as a publisher, he is most familiar today as the composer of the waltz on which Ludwig van Beethoven wrote his set of thirty-three Diabelli Variations.

Diabelli was born in Mattsee near Salzburg. He was trained to enter the priesthood, but also took music lessons with Michael Haydn. He moved to Vienna to teach the piano and guitar before becoming partners with Pietro Cappi in 1818 and setting up a music publishing firm with him.

The firm, Cappi & Diabelli (which became Diabelli & Co. in 1824) became well known by arranging popular pieces so they could be played by amateurs at home. The firm became well known in more serious music circles by becoming the first to publish works by Franz Schubert, a composer the firm later championed.

Diabelli produced a number of works as a composer, including an operetta called Adam in der Klemme, several masses and songs and numerous piano and classical guitar pieces. Among these are pieces for four hands (two pianists playing at one piano), which are popular among amateur pianists.

The composition for which Diabelli is now best known was actually written as part of a publishing venture. In 1819, he decided to try to publish a volume of variations on a waltz he had penned expressly for this purpose, with one variation by every important Austrian composer living at the time, as well as several significant non-Austrians. The combined contributions would be published in an anthology called Vaterländischer Künstlerverein. Fifty-one composers responded with pieces, including Beethoven, Schubert, Carl Czerny, Johann Nepomuk Hummel, Ignaz Moscheles, and the eight-year-old Franz Liszt (although it seems Liszt was not invited personally, but his teacher Czerny arranged for him to be involved). Czerny was also enlisted to write a coda. Beethoven, however, instead of providing just one variation, provided 33, and his formed Part I of Vaterländischer Künstlerverein. They constitute what is generally regarded as one of the greatest of Beethoven's piano pieces and as the greatest set of variations of their time, and are generally known simply as the Diabelli Variations, Op. 120. The other 50 variations were published as Part II of Vaterländischer Künstlerverein.

Diabelli's publishing house expanded throughout his life, before he retired in 1851, leaving it under the control of Carl Anton Spina. When Diabelli died in 1858, Spina continued to run the firm, and published much music by Johann Strauss II and Josef Strauss. In 1872, the firm was taken over by Friedrich Schreiber, and in 1876 it merged with the firm of August Cranz, who bought the company in 1879 and ran it under his name.

He died in Vienna at the age of 76.

Diabelli's composition Pleasures of Youth: Six Sonatinas is a collection of six sonatinas depicting a struggle between unknown opposing forces. This is suggested by the sharp and frequent change in dynamics from forte to piano. When forte is indicated, the pianist is meant to evoke a sense of wickedness, thus depicting the antagonist. In contrast, the markings of piano represent the protagonist with its softer, more tranquil tones.

September Composer

2010-09-01T03:09:00.000-07:00

Muzio Clementi (24 January 1752, Rome – 10 March 1832, Evesham, Worcestershire, England) was a celebrated Italian classical composer, pianist, pedagogue, conductor, music publisher, editor, and piano manufacturer. He is best known for his piano sonatas, sonatinas, and his collection of piano studies, Gradus ad Parnassum. Nineteenth century enthusiasts lauded Clementi as "the father of the pianoforte", "father of modern piano technique", and "father of Romantic pianistic virtuosity".

Encouraged to study music by his father, he was sponsored as a young composer by Sir Peter Beckford, a wealthy Englishman who brought him to England to advance his studies. He soon became known as one of the great piano virtuosi, touring Europe numerous times from his long time base in London. It was on one of these occasions in 1781 that he engaged in a famous piano improvisation duel with Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.

Influenced by Domenico Scarlatti's harpsichord school and Haydn's classical school and by the stile galante of Johann Christian Bach and Ignazio Cirri, Clementi developed a fluent, technical legato style which he passed on to an entire generation of pianists, including John Field, Johann Baptist Cramer, Ignaz Moscheles, Giacomo Meyerbeer, Friedrich Wilhelm Kalkbrenner, Johann Nepomuk Hummel and Carl Czerny. He was a notable influence on Ludwig van Beethoven.

Clementi also produced and promoted his own brand of pianos and was a notable music publisher. It was thanks to this activity that many compositions by contemporary (and earlier) artists have stayed in the repertory. Though the European reputation of Muzio Clementi was second only to Joseph Haydn in his day, his reputation has languished for much of the 19th and 20th centuries.[1]

August Composer

2010-08-06T15:08:00.000-07:00

John Field (26 July 1782 (?), baptized 5 September 1782 – 23 January 1837) was an Irish pianist, composer, and teacher. He was born in Dublin into a musical family, and received his early education there. The Fields soon moved to London, where Field studied under Muzio Clementi. Under his tutelage, Field quickly became a famous and sought-after concert pianist; together, master and pupil visited Paris, Vienna, and St. Petersburg. The Russian capital impressed Field so much that he eventually decided to stay behind when Clementi left, and from about 1804 was particularly active in Russia.

Field was very highly regarded by his contemporaries and his playing and compositions influenced many major composers, including Chopin, Brahms, Schumann, and Liszt. He is best known today for originating the piano nocturne, a form later made famous by Chopin, as well as for his substantial contribution, through concerts and teaching, to the development of the Russian piano school

July Composer

2010-07-01T05:50:00.000-07:00

Franz Joseph Haydn (31 March[1] 1732 – May 31 1809), known as Joseph Haydn (German pronunciation: [ˈjoːzɛf ˈhaɪdən]; English: /ˈdʒoʊzəf ˈhaɪdən/), was an Austrian composer, one of the most prolific and prominent composers of the classical period. He is often called the "Father of the Symphony" and "Father of the String Quartet" because of his important contributions to these genres. He was also instrumental in the development of the piano trio and in the evolution of sonata form.[2][3]

A life-long resident of Austria, Haydn spent much of his career as a court musician for the wealthy Hungarian aristocratic Esterházy family on their remote estate. Isolated from other composers and trends in music until the later part of his long life, he was, as he put it, "forced to become original".[4] At the time of his death, he was one of the most celebrated composers in Europe.[5]

Joseph Haydn was the brother of Michael Haydn, himself a highly regarded composer, and Johann Evangelist Haydn, a tenor. He was also a close friend of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and a teacher of Ludwig van Beethoven.

June Composer

2010-06-01T01:42:00.000-07:00

Igor Stravinsky

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Igor Stravinsky

Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky (Russian: Игорь Фёдорович Стравинский, Igor' Fjodorovič Stravinskij) (17 June [O.S. 5 June] 1882 – 6 April 1971) was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor, widely acknowledged as one of the most important and influential composers of 20th century music.^[1]^[2]^[3] He was a quintessentially cosmopolitan Russian who was named by Time magazine as one of the 100 most influential people of the century.^[4] He became a naturalized US citizen in 1946. In addition to the recognition he received for his compositions, he also achieved fame as a pianist and a conductor, often at the premieres of his works.

Stravinsky's compositional career was notable for its stylistic diversity. He first achieved international fame with three ballets commissioned by the impresario Sergei Diaghilev and performed by Diaghilev's Ballets Russes (Russian Ballets): The Firebird (1910), Petrushka (1911/1947), and The Rite of Spring (1913). The Rite, whose premiere provoked a riot, transformed the way in which subsequent composers thought about rhythmic structure, and was largely responsible for Stravinsky's enduring reputation as a musical revolutionary, pushing the boundaries of musical design.

After this first Russian phase Stravinsky turned to neoclassicism in the 1920s. The works from this period tended to make use of traditional musical forms (concerto grosso, fugue, symphony), frequently concealed a vein of intense emotion beneath a surface appearance of detachment or austerity, and often paid tribute to the music of earlier masters, for example J. S. Bach and Tchaikovsky.

In the 1950s he adopted serial procedures, using the new techniques over his last twenty years. Stravinsky's compositions of this period share traits with all of his earlier output: rhythmic energy, the construction of extended melodic ideas out of a few two- or three-note cells, and clarity of form, of instrumentation, and of utterance.

He also published a number of books throughout his career, almost always with the aid of a collaborator, sometimes uncredited. In his 1936 autobiography, Chronicles of My Life, written with the help of Walter Nouvel, Stravinsky included his infamous statement that "music is, by its very nature, essentially powerless to express anything at all."^[5] With Alexis Roland-Manuel and Pierre Souvtchinsky he wrote his 1939–40 Harvard University Charles Eliot Norton Lectures, which were delivered in French and later collected under the title Poétique musicale in 1942 (translated in 1947 as Poetics of Music).^[6] Several interviews in which the composer spoke to Robert Craft were published as Conversations with Igor Stravinsky.^[7] They collaborated on five further volumes over the following decade.

Stravinsky signed a full agreement with Boosey & Hawkes for his musical copyrights in 1947.^[8]

May Composer

2010-05-01T01:38:00.000-07:00

John Philip Sousa was born in Washington, D.C. on November 6, 1854 to António de Sousa and Maria Elisabeth Trinkhaus. His parents were of Portuguese, Spanish, and Bavarian (German) descent.^[2] Sousa started his music education by playing the violin as a pupil of John Esputa and G. F. Benkert for harmony and musical composition at the age of six. He was found to have absolute pitch. When Sousa reached the age of 13, his father, a trombonist in the Marine Band, enlisted his son in the United States Marine Corps as an apprentice to keep him from joining a circus band. Sousa served his apprenticeship for seven years until 1875 and apparently learned to play all the wind instruments while honing his mettle with the violin.

On December 30, 1879, Sousa married Jane van Middlesworth Bellis (1862–1944). They had three children together: John Philip Sousa, Jr (April 1, 1881 – May 18, 1937), Jane Priscilla (August 7, 1882 – October 28, 1958), and Helen (January 21, 1887 – October 14, 1975). All are buried in the John Philip Sousa plot in the Congressional Cemetery. Jane joined the Daughters of the American Revolution in 1907.

Several years later, Sousa left his apprenticeship to join a theatrical (pit) orchestra where he learned to conduct. He returned to the U.S. Marine Band as its head in 1880 and remained as its conductor until 1892. Sousa led The President's Own band under five presidents from Rutherford B. Hayes to Benjamin Harrison. Sousa's band played at two Inaugural Balls, including James Garfield in 1881, and Benjamin Harrison in 1889.^[3]^[4]

Sousa organized his own band the year he left the Marine Band. The Sousa Band toured from 1892–1931, performing at 15,623 concerts.^[5] In 1900, his band represented the United States at the Paris Exposition before touring Europe. In Paris, the Sousa Band marched through the streets including the Champs-Élysées to the Arc de Triomphe – one of only eight parades the band marched in over its forty years.

The marching brass bass, or sousaphone, was created in 1898 by C. G. Conn at Sousa's request for a tuba that could sound upward and over the band whether it was seated or marching.

Sousa repeatedly refused to conduct on the radio, fearing a lack of personal contact with the audience. He was finally persuaded to do so in 1929 and became a smash hit.^{[citation needed]}

Sousa lived in Sands Point, New York. There is a school (John Philip Sousa Elementary) and a band shell named after him and there is also a memorial tree planted in nearby Port Washington. Wild Bank, his seaside house on Hicks Lane, has been designated a National Historic Landmark, although it remains a private home and is not open to the public.

Sousa died of heart failure at the age of 77 at approximately 1:30 in the morning on March 6, 1932, in his room on the fourteenth floor of the Abraham Lincoln Hotel in Reading, Pennsylvania. He had conducted a rehearsal of "Stars and Stripes Forever" earlier that day with the Ringgold Band. He is buried in Washington, D.C.'s Congressional Cemetery.

New Website

2010-04-14T18:03:00.000-07:00

I found a great website that has some free music games. Check it out:

http://www.musictechteacher.com/musicquizzes.htm

Tell me what games you liked and why at your next lesson and you'll get a treat.

April Composer

2010-04-01T01:37:00.000-07:00

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Andrew Lloyd Webber

Andrew Lloyd Webber, Baron Lloyd-Webber (born 22 March 1948) is an English composer of musical theatre. He started composing at the age of six, and published his first piece at the age of nine.

Lloyd Webber has achieved great popular success, with several musicals that have run for more than a decade both in the West End and on Broadway. He has composed 13 musicals, a song cycle, a set of variations, two film scores, and a Latin Requiem Mass. He has also gained a number of honours, including a knighthood in 1992, followed by a peerage from the British Government for services to Music, six Tony Awards (and 40 nominations), three Grammy Awards (with an additional 60 nominations), an Academy Award (two other nominations), seven Olivier Awards (with 100 nominations), a Golden Globe, and the Kennedy Center Honors in 2006. Several of his songs, notably "The Music of the Night" from The Phantom of the Opera, "I Don't Know How to Love Him" from Jesus Christ Superstar, "Don't Cry for Me, Argentina" from Evita, "Any Dream Will Do" from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat and "Memory" from Cats have been widely recorded and were hits outside of their parent musicals. His company, the Really Useful Group, is one of the largest theatre operators in London.

March Composer

2010-03-08T11:36:00.000-08:00

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Irving Berlin

Irving Berlin (May 11, 1888 – September 22, 1989) was an American composer and lyricist widely considered one of the greatest songwriters in history.

His first hit song, "Alexander's Ragtime Band", became world famous. The song sparked an international dance craze in places as far away as Russia, which also "flung itself into the ragtime beat with an abandon bordering on mania." Over the years he was known for writing music and lyrics in the American vernacular: uncomplicated, simple and direct, with his aim being to "reach the heart of the average American" whom he saw as the "real soul of the country."

He wrote hundreds of songs, many becoming major hits, which made him "a legend" before he turned thirty. During his 60-year career he wrote an estimated 1,500 songs, including the scores for 19 Broadway shows and 18 Hollywood films, with his songs nominated eight times for Academy Awards. Many songs became popular themes and anthems, including "Easter Parade", "White Christmas", "Happy Holiday", "This is the Army, Mr. Jones", and "There's No Business Like Show Business". His Broadway musical and 1942 film, This is the Army, with Ronald Reagan, had Kate Smith singing Berlin's "God Bless America" which was first performed in 1938. After the September 11 attacks in 2001, Celine Dion recorded it as a tribute, making it #1 on the charts.

Berlin's songs have reached the top of the charts 25 times and have been re-recorded countless times by singers including Frank Sinatra, Barbra Streisand, Linda Ronstadt, Rosemary Clooney, Diana Ross, Bing Crosby, Rita Reys, Frankie Laine, Johnnie Ray, Al Jolson, Nat King Cole, Billie Holiday, and Ella Fitzgerald. Composer Douglas Moore sets Berlin apart from all other contemporary songwriters, and includes him instead with Stephen Foster, Walt Whitman, and Carl Sandburg, as a "great American minstrel" – someone who has "caught and immortalized in his songs what we say, what we think about, and what we believe." Composer George Gershwin called him "the greatest songwriter that has ever lived", and composer Jerome Kern concluded that "Irving Berlin has no place in American music - he is American music."

February Composer

2010-02-01T05:39:00.000-08:00

(James) Brian Bonsor (Born 21 August 1926 in Hawick) is a Scottish-born composer and teacher specialising in the recorder. He was awarded an MBE in 2002 for services to Teaching Music, especially the Recorder [1]. The Enjoy the Recorder (Schott & Co. Ltd. ISBN: 0901938718) book is widely used in schools. Other well known compositions include the following arrangements for recorders: Mock Morris (Percy Aldridge Grainger 1985), Cats (Andrew Lloyd Webber) and the Emperor Waltz (Johann Strauss 1985). Brian was a musical director for the Society of Recorder Players [2] starting in 1957 [3]. He spent about 35 years in musical education, latterly as Regional Advisor. He also worked with such famous people as Alison and Ashli Moody, who are both talented pianists.

Brian Bonsor also wrote the piano piece, 'Dreamy'. Which is played in G major. It has a relaxed and lazy feel about it. The difficulty level would be 6th grade. James Brian Bonsor also wrote another piece called 'Felin' Good'. It is a song that is very happy and jazzy. The level is about 7. 'Feelin' Good' was included in ABRSM's 0506 grade 6 reportoire.

January Composer

2010-01-01T05:34:00.000-08:00

Edward Alexander MacDowell (December 18, 1860^[1] - January 23, 1908) was an American composer and pianist of the Romantic period. He was best known for his second piano concerto and his piano suites "Woodland Sketches", "Sea Pieces", and "New England Idylls". "Woodland Sketches" includes his most popular short piece, "To a Wild Rose". In 1904 he was one of the first seven Americans honored by membership in the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

December Composer

2009-12-01T05:26:00.000-08:00

Johann Pachelbel (pronounced /ˈpækəlbɛl/^[1] baptized September 1, 1653 – buried March 9, 1706^[2]) was a German Baroque composer, organist and teacher, who brought the south German organ tradition to its peak. He composed a large body of sacred and secular music, and his contributions to the development of the chorale prelude and fugue have earned him a place among the most important composers of the middle Baroque era.^[3]

Pachelbel's work enjoyed enormous popularity during his lifetime; he had many pupils and his music became a model for the composers of south and central Germany. Today, Pachelbel is best known for the Canon in D, the only canon he wrote - although a true canon at the unison in three parts, it is often regarded more as a passacaglia, and it is in this mode that it has been arranged and transcribed for many different media. In addition to the canon, his most well-known works include the Chaconne in F minor, the Toccata in E minor for organ, and the Hexachordum Apollinis, a set of keyboard variations.^[4]

Pachelbel's music was influenced by southern German composers, such as Johann Jakob Froberger and Johann Kaspar Kerll, Italians such as Girolamo Frescobaldi and Alessandro Poglietti, French composers, and the composers of the Nuremberg tradition. Pachelbel preferred a lucid, uncomplicated contrapuntal style that emphasized melodic and harmonic clarity. His music is less virtuosic and less adventurous harmonically than that of Dieterich Buxtehude, although, like Buxtehude, Pachelbel experimented with different ensembles and instrumental combinations in his chamber music and, most importantly, his vocal music, much of which features exceptionally rich instrumentation. Pachelbel explored many variation forms and associated techniques, which manifest themselves in various diverse pieces, from sacred concertos to harpsichord suites.

November Composer

2009-10-29T18:20:00.000-07:00

Grieg was born in Bergen, Norway on 15 June 1843. The original family name was spelled Greig, originally from Scotland. After the Battle of Culloden in 1746, his great-grandfather traveled widely, settling in Norway around 1770, and establishing business interests in Bergen. Grieg was raised in a musical home. His mother, Gesine B. Hagerup, became his first piano teacher, who taught him to play from the age of 6. He studied in several schools including Tank's School, and often brought in examples of his music to class.

Grieg had close ties with the Bergen Philharmonic Orchestra (Harmonien), and later became Music Director of the orchestra from 1880–1882.

Edvard Grieg died in the autumn of 1907, aged 64, after a long period of illness. His final words were "Well, if it must be so".

October Composer

2009-10-01T05:38:00.000-07:00

William Ross (composer)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

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William Ross (born 1948) is an American composer, orchestrator, arranger, conductor and music director. He has worked with a large array of artists and musicians, from famous Hollywood composers John Williams, Alan Silvestri, Klaus Badelt or Michael Kamen, to pop music icons and best-sellers such as Barbra Streisand, Celine Dion, Josh Groban, Whitney Houston, Kenny G, Michael Jackson, David Foster, Quincy Jones and Babyface and Sting.

Mr. Ross has composed the soundtrack for films such as Tuck Everlasting, The Little Rascals (film) and Ladder 49. He adapted and conducted John Williams's themes for Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets.

Ross has been Music Director on many shows and for various artists, including on Barbra Streisand's 2006 US tour and 2007 European tour, as well as on the 79th Academy Awards.

William Ross' most recent work is the score to the CGI-film The Tale of Despereaux, from Universal Studios.

September Composer

2009-09-01T05:35:00.000-07:00

Frédéric Chopin

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The only known photograph of Chopin (taken by Bisson in 1849, the year of Chopin's death)

Frederic [Francois] Chopin (Polish: Fryderyk [Franciszek] Chopin, sometimes Szopen; French: Frédéric [François] Chopin; surname pronounced /ˈʃoʊpæn/ in English; French pronunciation: [ʃɔpɛ̃]; 1 March 1810^[1] – 17 October 1849) was a Polish composer and virtuoso pianist.^[2]^[3] He was one of the great masters of Romantic music.^[4]

Chopin was born in the village of Żelazowa Wola, in the Duchy of Warsaw, to a French-expatriate father and Polish mother and was regarded as a child-prodigy^[5]^[6] pianist. On 2 November 1830, at the age of twenty, he left Warsaw for Austria, intending to go on to Italy. The outbreak of the Polish November Uprising seven days later, and its subsequent suppression by Russia, led to Chopin becoming one of many expatriates of the Polish Great Emigration.^[7]

In Paris, Chopin made a comfortable living as a composer and piano teacher, while giving few public performances. Though an ardent Polish patriot,^[8]^[9] in France he used the French versions of his names and eventually, to avoid having to rely on Imperial Russian documents, became a French citizen.^[10]^[11]^[12] After some ill-fated romantic involvements with Polish women, from 1837 to 1847 he had a turbulent relationship with the French authoress George Sand. Always in frail health, he died in Paris in 1849, aged thirty-nine, of pulmonary

Chopin's compositions were written primarily for the piano as solo instrument. Though they are technically demanding,^[15] the emphasis in his style is on nuance and expressive depth. Chopin invented musical forms such as the instrumental ballade^[16] and was responsible for major innovations in the piano sonata, mazurka, waltz, nocturne, étude, impromptu and prélude.

August Composer of the Month

2009-08-01T05:00:00.000-07:00

Joseph-Maurice Ravel (March 7, 1875 – December 28, 1937) was a French composer of Impressionist music known especially for the subtlety, richness, and poignancy of his melodies, orchestral and instrumental textures and effects. Much of his piano music, chamber music, vocal music and orchestral music has entered the standard concert repertoire.

Ravel's piano compositions, such as Jeux d'eau, Miroirs and Gaspard de la Nuit, demand considerable virtuosity from the performer, and his orchestral music, including Daphnis et Chloé and his arrangement of Modest Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition, uses tonal color and variety of sound and instrumentation very effectively.

Ravel is perhaps best known for his orchestral work, Boléro, which he considered trivial and once described as "a piece for orchestra without music."

According to SACEM, Ravel's estate earns more royalties than that of any other French musician. According to international copyright law, Ravel's works are public domain since January 1, 2008 in most countries. In France, due to anomalous copyright law extensions to account for the two world wars, they will not enter the public domain until 2015.

Fun Music Games

2009-07-08T09:50:00.000-07:00

I found this great website with some wonderful music learning games. There are many games that are free and will help with some basics of piano learning. It is http://www.musiclearningcommunity.com . If you check it out, tell me about what games you played and what you learned and you will get a candy bar.

July Composer of the Month

2009-07-01T05:00:00.000-07:00

Edward Alexander MacDowell (December 18, 1860 - January 23, 1908) was an American composer and pianist of the Romantic period. He was best known for his second piano concerto and his piano suites "Woodland Sketches", "Sea Pieces", and "New England Idylls". "Woodland Sketches" includes his most popular short piece, "To a Wild Rose". In 1904 he was one of the first seven Americans honored by membership in the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

June Composer of the Month

2009-06-08T14:41:00.000-07:00

Ludwig van Beethoven (16 December 1770 – 26 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. He was a crucial figure in the transitional period between the Classical and Romantic eras in Western classical music, and remains one of the most acclaimed and influential of all composers.

Born in Bonn, then in the Electorate of Cologne in western Germany, he moved to Vienna in his early twenties and settled there, studying with Joseph Haydn and quickly gaining a reputation as a virtuoso pianist. Beethoven's hearing gradually deteriorated beginning in his twenties, yet he continued to compose, and to conduct and perform, even after he was completely deaf.

New Blog

2009-06-08T14:40:00.000-07:00

I have had some issues with my old website, so I have decided to switch to blogging. Hopefully this one will work better!