Soon after the successful première of Giuseppe Verdi’s first opera Oberto, Bartolomeo Merelli, the impresario at La Scala commissioned three further operas. The comic opera Un giorno di regno was a disastrous failure, and contemporary critics considered the question of

Celebrating his 60th birthday in 1863, Hector Berlioz was overcome by a “despair and disillusionment of appalling intensity.” Mourning the loss of two sisters and two wives, he became morbidly conscious of death. In 1864 he writes, “I am in

Georgian-born violinist Lisa Batiashvili made her dreams become a reality. Ever since she was a little girl, she wanted to become a violinist, live in Europe, and have a family. And that’s exactly what she has accomplished. She was born

The Canadian conductor and pianist Yannick Nézet-Séguin holds the leading positions at two of America’s most storied musical institutions, the New York Metropolitan opera, and the Philadelphia Orchestra. Born on 6 March 1975 in Montreal, Yannick knew from a very

Sergei Prokofiev’s death on 5 March 1953, only about one hour before the passing of Joseph Stalin, went almost unnoticed in the press. In fact, his death went unreported for some days. Sovetskaya Muzyka finally carried his obituary in the

The city of Venice underwent a fundamental transformation towards the end of the 17th century. For centuries Venice had wielded considerable economic powers based on the manufacturing of textiles and from trade with Europe and Asia. Gradually, however, culture became

For well over 20 years, Johannes Brahms (1833-1896) seriously considered writing an opera. In 1869, encouraged by the conductor Hermann Levi and the engraver Julius Allgeyer, Brahms initially contemplated, more or less seriously, operatic settings of Méhul’s Uthal, the heroic

Joseph Haydn (1732-1809) was already considered the greatest living composer when the impresario Johann Peter Salomon invited him to compose and conduct first six, and later six more symphonies for the cosmopolitan audiences in London. The British press hailed him