Composers Datebook

Composers Datebook™ is a daily two-minute program designed to inform, engage, and entertain listeners with timely information about composers of the past and present. Each program notes significant or intriguing musical events involving composers of the past and present, with appropriate and accessible music related to each.

Eine durchschnittliche Folge dieses Podcasts dauert 2m. Bisher sind 2794 Folge(n) erschienen. Dies ist ein täglich erscheinender Podcast.

Gesamtlänge aller Episoden: 3 days 20 hours 50 minutes

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Schubertiades


Synopsis

On today’s date in 1828, Franz Schubert gave his first — and only — public concert in Vienna, which opened with the first movement of a recently composed string quartet. We don’t know for sure which one, since Schubert was writing a lot of new music then, but most likely it was from his String Quartet in G, which we know as No. 15...


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Gao Hong


Synopsis

On today’s date in 2012, the Minneapolis Guitar Quartet — an ensemble committed to commissioning original works as well as performing new arrangements for four guitars — gave the premiere performance of a suite that took them far afield: to Guangxi province in China, to be exact. The new work, Guangxi Impression, took place at Sundin Hall in St. Paul, but the sounds the four guitarists produced evoked not only a far-off Chinese landscape, but Chinese instruments, as well...


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Handel and 'The Arrival of the Queen of Sheba'


Synopsis

One of Handel’s “greatest hits” had its premiere on today’s date in 1749 at London’s Covent Garden Theatre, as part of his new biblical oratorio, Solomon.


The text of Handel’s oratorio praises the legendary Hebrew king’s piety in Part 1, his wisdom in Part 2 and the splendor of his royal court in Part 3.


As the instrumental introduction to the third part of Solomon, Handel composed a jaunty sinfonia he titled “The Arrival of the Queen of Sheba...


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The morning after for Sergei Rachmaninoff


Synopsis

In St. Petersburg on today’s date in 1897, the First Symphony of Sergei Rachmaninoff had its disastrous premiere.


Now, there are bad reviews and then there are really bad reviews...


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Roman's 'Musica de Palladium'


Synopsis

The Palladium Ballroom once stood at the corner of 53rd Street and Broadway in New York City. It opened on today’s date in 1946, and in its heyday, was the mambo capital of the world, showcasing performances by Latin superstars like Tito Puente, Tito Rodríguez and Machito.


The Palladium closed in 1966, but its dance floor and bandstand were re-created for the 1992 film The Mambo Kings, in which Puente plays himself...


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Johann Strauss the Elder


Synopsis

Johann Strauss the Elder, patriarch of the famous waltz dynasty, was born in Vienna on this day in 1804. His music became immensely popular across Europe, and he dreamed of — but never realized — a tour of America.


At the height of his fame, Strauss visited Britain, providing music for the state ball on the occasion of Queen Victoria's accession to the throne...


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Terence Blanchard's birthday


Synopsis

Today’s date in 1962 marks the birthday in New Orleans of Terence Blanchard, American jazz trumpeter, composer and educator.


“I come from a family of musicians,” Blanchard says. “My father was an opera singer, my mother played piano and taught voice, my grandfather played the guitar. What I wanted was to be a jazz musician, have a band, travel and create music...


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Copland's fanfare for America's 'Greatest Generation'?


Synopsis

On today’s date in 1943, at the height of World War II, Aaron Copland’s Fanfare for the Common Man had its premiere performance in Cincinnati. The Cincinnati Symphony’s conductor in those days, British-born Eugene Goosens, had commissioned 18 fanfares for brass and percussion.


“It is my idea,” he wrote, “to make these fanfares stirring and significant contributions to the war effort...


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Mendelssohn dusts off an old classic


Synopsis

On today’s date in 1829, a 20-year-old German composer named Felix Mendelssohn conducted the first public performance of Johann Sebastian Bach’s St. Matthew Passion in almost a hundred years. Earlier, Mendelssohn had written to a friend:


“You may know from the papers that I intend to perform the Passion, by Sebastian Bach, a very beautiful and worthy piece of church music from the last century, on March 11 at the Berlin Academy of Music...


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Mozart says, 'Call me Amade'


Synopsis

On this date in 1785, a new Piano Concerto in C major was given its premiere at the Burgtheater in Vienna, with its composer, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, at the keyboard.


Years later, this piano concerto was labeled as Mozart’s 21st, and given the number 467 in the chronological list of his works compiled by Ludwig Ritter von Koechel, an Austrian botanist, mineralogist and Mozart enthusiast...


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