“The only love affair I have ever had was with music.”
Maurice Ravel
The history of classical music, however, is full of fabulously gifted individuals with slightly more earthy ambitions. Love stories of classical composers are frequently retold within a romanticized narrative of sugarcoated fairy tales. To be sure, happily-ever-after stories do on rare occasions take place, but it is much more likely that classical romances lead to some rather unhappy endings. Johannes Brahms had an overriding fear of commitment, Claude Debussy drove his wife into an attempt at suicide, Francis Poulenc severely struggled with his sexual identity, and Percy Grainger was heavily into whips and bondage. And that’s only the beginning! The love life of classical composers will sometimes make you weep, or alternately shout out with joy or anguish. You might even cringe with embarrassment as we try to go beyond the usual headlines and niceties to discover the psychological makeup and the societal and cultural pressures driving these relationships. Classical composer’s love stories are not for the faint hearted; they are heightened reflections of humanity at its best and worst. Accompanying these stories of love and lust with the compositions they inspired, we are able to see composers and their relationships in a completely new light.
There can be no doubt that Lotti Speyer had seriously enflamed the romantic passions of the young Richard Strauss. After a short ten days at the little spa of Heilbrunn, however, the two lovebirds had to return to their respective
During the summer of 1883, the nineteen-year-old Richard Strauss (1864-1949) spent a short ten-day holiday at the little spa of Heilbrunn. Located between Bad Tölz and the Kochelsee in Bavaria, the natural thermal springs and forested rolling hills had long
Jean-Philippe Rameau: Dardanus “Overture” Jean-Philippe Rameau was deeply in love with Marie-Louise Mangot. She must have been a remarkably charming, and extremely pretty 19-year old maiden. After all, a 42-year old bachelor does not give up his solitude all that
Jean-Philippe Rameau: Hippolyte et Aricie, “Ou suis-je?” Jean-Philippe Rameau was extremely tall and thin, “more like a ghost than a man.” He had a sharp chin, no stomach, flutes for legs and his eagle profile was aesthetically so attractive that
Stephen Foster: I dream of Jeannie with the light brown hair To everyone’s surprise, Stephen Foster married Jane McDowell, daughter of a leading Pittsburgh physician, on 22 July 1850. For friends and mutual acquaintances, it remained a mystery why the
Stephen Collins Foster grew up in Alleghany City, a Pennsylvania municipality located at the junction of the Allegheny and Ohio rivers. The Foster’s shared a large two-family house with the family of a retired Army Officer. Captain Pentland was a
Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach: Morning Song on the Day of Creation, Wq. 239 In the spring of 1768, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach and his family relocated to the city of Hamburg. C.P.E. had been appointed Kantor at the Johanneum and
Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach: Keyboard Concerto in D Major, Wq. 13, H. 416 (1744) Approaching the ripe old age of 30, Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach had a steady but poorly paid job with Frederick II, King of Prussia. Away from
