In classical music, the Romantic Era lasted from around 1810 to around 1910. That century gave us some of the most famous symphonies in the repertoire. Nineteenth-century composers like Tchaikovsky, Brahms, Dvořák, Schubert, Mahler, Rachmaninoff, and others elevated the symphony
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Eugène Ysaÿe: Six Sonatas for Solo Violin, Op. 27
“Mirroring the technical evolution and expressions of his time” May 19th, 2021In 1923, Eugène Ysaÿe attended a performance by the great violinist Joseph Szigeti. The entire concert was dedicated to Ysaÿe’s favorite composer, Johann Sebastian Bach. Deeply moved and inspired, Ysaÿe went to work and over the course of twenty-four hours -
Wolfgang A. Mozart and His Fellow Musicians III May 18th, 2021 Maria Theresia Paradis (1759-1824) was the daughter of the Imperial Secretary of Commerce and Court Councilor to Empress Maria Theresa. She lost her eyesight at the age of 4, and although she initially responded to treatment, she relapsed into her -
Who Owns What?
Stories on Intellectual Property; Copyrights and Royalties May 17th, 2021Royalties are quite unique to the music world; indeed composers and songwriters benefit from the advantage of being rewarded for each active and passive use of their works. While the painter, for instance, does not earn each time his work -
Classical Music Beyond the Concert Stage: Ten Classical Pieces Used in Commercials May 17th, 2021 Have you ever heard any advertisement music on the radio and TV that sounds familiar to you? A lot of them are excerpts or adaptations from classical music. I am going to share with you ten pieces that have been -
Encouraging Engagement With Classical Music May 16th, 2021 Encouraging people to engage with and listen to classical music is an ongoing preoccupation for musicians, concert promoters, venue managers, critics and others. The perennial anxiety is that classical music is ‘dying’ (it’s not) and that it needs to attract -
Art and Music: Klee and Schuller May 16th, 2021 American composer Gunther Schuller (1925-2015) took the Swiss artist Paul Klee (1879-1940) as his inspirational source for his 1959 orchestral work 7 Studies on Themes of Paul Klee. The seven works he chose were created between 1912 and 1933 and -
Robert Burns (1759-1796)
National Poet of Scotland May 15th, 2021In 2021 we celebrate the 225th passing of Robert Burns, Scotland’s national poet. He died on the morning of 21 July 1796 at the age of 37, and he had been a practicing poet throughout his life. Famous for his -
Opera Wars
Gluck vs. Piccinni May 14th, 2021When Christoph Willibald Gluck (1714-1787) set out to reform opera, he knowingly provided the spark for a full-out culture war. Gluck believed that the principal Italian operatic genres—opera buffa and opera seria—had become unnatural. Characters seemed nothing more than empty