Know Your Composer
When a professional musician from Helsinki toured the Finnish countryside in the last years of the 19th century, a member of the audience asked him, “Are there other great composers in Helsinki besides Merikanto?” This delightful anecdote certainly tells us something about the enormous popularity of Oskar Merikanto (1868–1924)
Know Your Composer
A tribute during Beethoven’s 250th birth anniversary “An artist must never stand still.” – Ludwig van Beethoven In December 1770, a child was born in Bonn, Germany, who would go on to make such a powerful impact in music, an impact that would endure down the centuries. We celebrate his
Know Your Composer
When families migrate across linguistic borders, their names frequently undergo a number of significant changes. Just take the Stamitz family, an extended and highly active Bohemian group of musicians, as an example. The spelling of their family name in contemporary sources was extraordinarily erratic, with the most common variants being
Know Your Composer
Alfred Brendel describes Schubert as “a sleepwalker”, yet in his final three sonatas, we see Schubert’s innate sense of musical geometry and his bold treatment of traditional sonata form. These are tightly-organised woks with almost perfectly-balanced structures, perhaps most obviously in the middle sonata of the triptych, the D959
Know Your Composer
Ignored for years, their composer regarded as Beethoven‘s poor relation, Schubert‘s last three piano sonatas now enjoy a special place in the piano repertoire, ranking alongside Beethoven’s final three piano sonatas, and they hold a particular fascination for pianists, audiences, critics and musicologists. The final year of
Know Your Composer
The Scarlatti family name—in various spellings—was common in Sicily, with several branches of additional Scarlatti families residing in Rome and northern Italy. Alessandro Scarlatti (1660-1725) was the musical bedrock of the family, and he became the most important opera composer of his generation in Italy. Besides roughly 100
Know Your Composer
Background: Augsburg and Vienna Maria Anna (Nannette) Streicher (1769-1838) was a piano maker, composer, teacher, and writer who is perhaps best known for her Viennese pianos and for her friendship with Beethoven. She was born in Augsburg in 1769 into a family of musicians, and her father – Johann Andreas Stein
Know Your Composer
Historically, the works of many women composers did not quite make it into the canon. It is perhaps why the female sensibility continues to be viewed through a celebratory lens – like a rare event, so to say. We take a look at some of these prolific composers who did not
Know Your Composer
Cited as the first composer to rethink every parameter of his music, Franz Liszt was an inveterate boundary-pusher, as eccentric as he was prolific, and without a doubt, the prototype of the modern-day rock star. By Manohar Parnerkar Franz Liszt, the 19th-century Hungarian-born composer, pianist and conductor, will always remain
Know Your Composer
In 1887, Spanish composer Isaac Albéniz brought together a number of works for solo piano that he’d written the previous year and created his Suite Española No. 1, Op. 47. The works take the entire country for their inspiration, with each title reflecting the inspiring region. In addition to
Know Your Composer
My interest in the wonderful music of Claude Debussy began in the 1980s when I researched and published a book with Cambridge University Press entitled Debussy and the Theatre. During the course of my studies in Paris, I was amazed to discover that Debussy planned over 50 theatrical works but
Know Your Composer
Known for his melodic invention and wonderful harmonic language, Sergei Rachmaninoff’s ever popular Piano Concerto No. 2 was an act of hope and rehabilitation. By Manohar Parnerkar Besides being an important composer of the 20th century, Sergei Rachmaninoff was also a brilliant pianist and, potentially, a great conductor. This