In 1742, Bach, late in his career, took a long look back at the music of his day and made such a thorough-going parody of it that we’re still not sure if he was making a social commentary or a

Nothing came easy for Anton Bruckner, and habitually plagued by debilitating periods of low self-esteem, he was an easy target for music critics, journalists and composers alike. A particularly vicious critic accused him of “composing like a drunkard.” Given such

Fulgores From PALOMO, L.: Sinfonía Córdoba / Fulgores (2018) Released by Naxos Palomo: Fulgores One of Spain’s most internationally admired living composers, Lorenzo Palomo is the natural successor to Joaquín Turina. His orchestral music shares a sense of rhapsodic freedom

Charles Gounod unabashedly referred to Pauline Viardot as “The godmother of my career.” He first met her around a rather difficult time in his life. His brother Urbain had unexpectedly passed away, leaving behind a two-year-old child and a widow

Pauline Elisabeth Ottilie Luise zu Wied (1843– 1916), the Queen of Romania as the wife of King Carol I of Romania, led her literary life as the author Carmen Sylva. She wrote across a wide number of genres, including poems,

Popular culture has always been mesmerized by the exploits of the Venetian adventurer and author Giacomo Girolamo Casanova (1725-1798). Primarily remembered for his countless affairs with women and a handful of men, he was also a scam artist who made

The appeal of Serge Diaghilev’s productions for the Ballets Russes is based on the novelty of Russian dance, and on its penchant for exotic subjects, many of them folkloric in nature. Igor Stravinsky scored a Parisian triumph for Diaghilev‘s troupe

Upon departing from Italy, Mikhail Glinka stopped in Berlin and took some counterpoint lessons from Siegfried Dehn. The study of counterpoint fueled his desire to write a national opera, as he wrote to a friend, “I have a project in