In a sense, the thing furthest away from Classical music is pop music. But, in another sense, the two kinds of music are far closer than you think!

Sergei Prokofiev (1891-1953) started experimenting with a number of short piano works in 1915, completed them in 1917, and gave them their first public performance on 15 April 1918 in Petrograd/St. Petersburg. At a private performance some months before, the

To prepare for the birth of her sixth child, Constanze Mozart visited a local spa in 1791. Located near Vienna, the small town of Baden had since medieval times provided relaxation and cures for Austria’s ruling families. Constanze certainly needed

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart could not have known that his time in Paris in 1778 was about to take a tragic turn. He reports to his father “my dearest mother is very ill.” Suffering from shivering and feverishness, diarrhea and headache,

We all know that Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart did a lot of traveling. In fact, it has been calculated that he spent over 10 years, roughly one third of his short life on the road. Mozart visited ten countries and more

Known as the “English Debussy” Cyril Meir Scott (1879-1970) tellingly remarked, “That I should appeal to Eastern taste is curious because I have never been to the East, nor have I heard much Eastern music. I can, therefore, only account

One of the most interesting of the small forms is the variation. Typically, a theme is presented so that the audience is on the same footing at the composer. Then, the composer shows off by taking the original theme and

Frédéric Chopin had turned twenty-five when he fell passionately and hopelessly in love with sixteen-year old Maria Wodzińska. He had known her as a child, and “used to chase her through the rooms at Pszenny.” She in turn greatly “annoyed