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.
Gesamtlänge aller Episoden: 3 days 20 hours 54 minutes
Bolcom's "Ghost" Rags
Many good things come in threes—at least William Bolcom seems to think so. On today’s date in 1971, in a converted garage next to a graveyard in Newburgh, New York, American composer and pianist W...
Rorem's concerto for the "English" Horn
“English Horn” is an odd name for an instrument—for starters, it’s not English, and, it’s not a brass instrument, like the French horn. The English horn is, in fact, a double reed instrument, a l...
Paine's Symphony No. 1
Today’s date marks an important anniversary in the history of the American symphony. On January 26, 1876, the Symphony No. 1 in c minor of John Knowles Paine was premiered in Boston. This was the f...
Paul Schoenfield's "Cafe Music"
Many a political work of art has had its origin in a smoke-filled room, but not all that many piano trios can claim such a venue for their inspiration. On today’s date in 1987, composer and pianist...
HRH is amused
“We are NOT amused,” is the dour statement often attributed to the matronly Queen Victoria in her later years, although some historians dispute she ever really said it. But as a young woman, in he...
Notable Dvořák and Ellington concerts in New York
On today’s date in 1894, during the New York Herald’s clothing fund drive, readers of that newspaper would have seen this announcement of a concert that evening at Madison Square Garden: “Hear Step...
Richard Strauss and Terry Riley put their spin on Salome's dance
One of the 20th century’s most important—and most lurid—operas had its American premiere at the Metropolitan Opera on today’s date in 1907. Richard Strauss’s “Salome” is a faithful setting of Osca...
The final days of John Dowland
One of the most famous British composers from the Age of Shakespeare was the lutenist and songwriter John Dowland. His life is better documented than many of his contemporaries, but much about him ...
Ives and Adamo meet The Alcotts
Now, it might seem unlikely that Katherine Hepburn, Winona Ryder and Charles Ives might have anything in common, but bear with us a moment... Hepburn appeared in a 1933 film based on Louisa May A...
A Fanfare for JFK
When boomers wax nostalgic about the Kennedy Administration, it’s Lerner & Loewe’s musical “Camelot” they start to hum. After all, “Camelot” opened in 1960 just a month after John F. Kennedy wa...