The conductor Adolf Čech (1841-1903) premiered a number of significant works by Antonín Dvořák, Zdeněk Fibich, and Bedřich Smetana. Such was the case on 4 April 1875, when he took the podium with the Orchestra of the Prague Provisional Theatre

Johannes Brahms was certainly open to life’s pleasures, and he would never decline a good meal. He once told a friend, “I live in Vienna as if I were in the country,” and he ate his lunch at the same

Throughout the history of music, a good many composers had been able to claim aristocratic lineage. Such is certainly the case with Sergei Rachmaninoff, born on 1 April 1873. His father Vassili Rachmaninoff, son of the landowner Arkadi Rachmaninoff and

The village of Rohrau steadily grew from a Roman road and river crossing to support a castle built in the Middle Ages. When the village was attacked in the early 18th century by “a peasant army of the anti-Habsburg Hungarian

Critics have written, “Few clarinetists today show such technical perfection as Sabine Meyer.” In fact, she has quietly achieved superstardom “through a combination of effortless but unmistakable accomplishment, well-honed technical skills, a varied palette of sound and an irresistible musicality.

Mstislav Rostropovich has been called the greatest cellist of the second half of the 20th century, and one of the greatest of all time. Armed with impeccable technique, his playing produced a unique richness of tone as he famously exploited

Probably the most important 20th century French composer of the avant-garde, Pierre Boulez was born on 26 March 1925 in Montbrison, a small town in the Loire department to Léon and Marcelle (née Calabre) Boulez. He tirelessly worked on behalf

As German troops bombarded the city of Paris, Claude Debussy died in 25 March 1918. The chaotic situation did no permit a public funeral, but a lonely funeral cortège nevertheless made its way through deserted streets, passing the Tuileries, and