This is the 2023 archive of my daily stories, with an overview at User:Gerda Arendt/Story list. -- Gerda Arendt ( talk) 10:33, 1 January 2024 (UTC)
... and a selection here -- Gerda Arendt ( talk) 22:02, 7 February 2024 (UTC)
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Concentricities,
a 2019
clarinet–cello–piano trio by
Graham Waterhouse,
musically depicts a theme
of circular, spiraling, or oscillating concentric phenomena
in nature and human structures
Compositions by Graham Waterhouse
range from the beginning
of his
String Sextet, Op. 1, in 1979
to the Fantasia Ucraina for two violins in 2022.
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Stanislavski and Nemirovich-Danchenko Theatre |
Volodymyr Kozhukhar,
the chief conductor
of the
National Opera of Ukraine in Kyiv,
led Lysenko's opera
Taras Bulba
and Shchedrin's ballet
Carmen Suite.
Galina Pisarenko,
a
soprano of Moscow's
Stanislavski and Nemirovich-Danchenko Theatre
for almost 30 years,
taught at the
Moscow Conservatory
until her death at age 88.
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d. 13 January 2012 |
Guido Dessauer,
a German executive and art collector,
registered more than 30 patents
in paper technology
and started the career of
Horst Janssen
as a
lithographer
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In
Mother and Child,
composed in 2002 by
John Tavener
for the vocal ensemble
Tenebrae,
organ and temple
gong
enter for the climax.
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Elisabeth Waterhouse founded
the National Chamber Music Course summer school in 1974
and has managed it since.
Graham Waterhouse began
his
String Sextet op. 1 in 1979,
and completed it 34 years later.
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The
Messe in A by
Christopher Tambling,
originally set for high voices,
proved so popular that a four-part version was commissioned.
Johannes Schröder composed an
oratorio
honouring
Katharina Kaspar,
who became a new
saint in 2018.
Mezzo-soprano
Elena Manistina
stepped in on short notice for the premiere
of Tchaikovsky's
The Enchantress at
Oper Frankfurt.
Clytus Gottwald arranged compositions
for an
a cappella group of up to 16 voices,
re-creating them "in a magical choral world".
19 July 2012
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Clytus Gottwald arranged compositions
for an
a cappella group of up to 16 voices,
re-creating them "in a magical choral world".
The
Romanesque church
St. Peter
in Syburg, now a suburb of
Dortmund,
is surrounded by a graveyard
with stones dating back to the ninth century.
Clytus Gottwald arranged compositions
for an
a cappella group of up to 16 voices,
re-creating them "in a magical choral world".
Gertrude Pitzinger,
who toured Europe and the United States singing
Lieder,
recorded the alto part of Mozart's
Requiem,
conducted by
Ferenc Fricsay.
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In 1866 a
Neogothic style school building
was erected for the
Kreuzschule in
Dresden,
which has educated members of
the choir of the
Kreuzkirche since 1300.
Clytus Gottwald arranged compositions
for an
a cappella group of up to 16 voices,
re-creating them "in a magical choral world".
In
Bach's chorale cantata
Ich hab in Gottes Herz und Sinn, BWV 92,
for
Septuagesima, he created
five different settings for
five stanzas of the hymn by
Paul Gerhardt.
Mezzo-soprano
Elena Manistina
stepped in on short notice for the premiere
of Tchaikovsky's
The Enchantress at
Oper Frankfurt.
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Nikolaus Herman based
the melody of his
Christmas carol
"
Lobt Gott, ihr Christen alle gleich"
on the
Gregorian hymn
"
Puer natus est nobis".
Mezzo-soprano
Elena Manistina
stepped in on short notice for the premiere
of Tchaikovsky's
The Enchantress
at
Oper Frankfurt.
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Soprano
Melitta Muszely
appeared as the four women
Hoffmann loves
in
Felsenstein's production
at the
Komische Oper Berlin in 1958,
and still sang recitals at age 80.
Bach's
solo cantata
Ich habe genug, BWV 82,
based on the
Canticle of Simeon,
has been recorded more than 100 times.
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Soprano
Melitta Muszely
appeared as the four women
Hoffmann loves
in
Felsenstein's production
at the
Komische Oper Berlin in 1958,
and still sang recitals at age 80.
Composer and music director
August Röckel,
who was active in the
May Uprising in Dresden
along with his friend
Richard Wagner,
was arrested and was the last prisoner released.
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born 4 February 1944 |
Michael Herrmann (pictured)
is founder-director of the
Rheingau Musik Festival,
which holds about 150 concerts every season
in vineyards and historical buildings.
Soprano
Melitta Muszely
appeared as the four women
Hoffmann loves
in
Felsenstein's production
at the
Komische Oper Berlin in 1958,
and still sang recitals at age 80.
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Hans Krieger,
an
award-winning German
essayist,
influential in papers such as
Die Zeit,
wrote the text for a Christmas cantata
by
Graham Waterhouse that premieres today.
Soprano
Melitta Muszely
appeared as the four women
Hoffmann loves
in
Felsenstein's production
at the
Komische Oper Berlin in 1958,
and still sang recitals at age 80.
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Nicolas Joel,
general manager of the
Paris Opera from 2009 to 2014,
directed Wagner's
Ring in 1979
after having assisted
Patrice Chéreau for
the cycle's centenary.
Soprano
Melitta Muszely
appeared as the four women
Hoffmann loves
in
Felsenstein's production
at the
Komische Oper Berlin in 1958,
and still sang recitals at age 80.
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Jesus nahm zu sich die Zwölfe ('Jesus gathered the Twelve to Himself', is a church cantata by Johann Sebastian Bach, written for the last Sunday before Lent. He composed it as an audition piece for the position of director of church music in Leipzig, and he first performed it there in a church service at the Thomaskirche on 7 February 1723. The work begins with a scene from the Gospel in which Jesus predicts his suffering in Jerusalem, and is not understood by his disciples. Bach showed, setting the prescribed text of an unknown poet, that he mastered the composition of a dramatic scene, an expressive aria with obbligato oboe, a recitative with strings, an exuberant dance, and a chorale in the style of Johann Kuhnau, his predecessor in Leipzig. According to the Bach scholar Richard D. P. Jones, several elements of the work such as a "frame of biblical text and chorale around the operatic forms of aria and recitative" became standards for Bach's Leipzig cantatas and even his Passions. ( Full article...)
After
Domen Križaj from Slovenia
was a prize winner in the singing competition
Neue Stimmen,
he moved to the
Oper Frankfurt where he appeared
as Massenet's
Albert and Mozart's
Papageno.
In
Patrick Süskind's play
Der Kontrabaß,
the double bass in the title role
is a "constant handicap" to its player,
"humanly, socially, sexually, musically".
Ukrainian actress
Oksana Shvets,
who was killed in the
2022 invasion of Ukraine,
starred in the 2013 joint Ukrainian–Russian television family saga
House with Lilies alongside Russian actors.
Dennis Russell Davies conducted
the premiere of the Fifth Symphony
Now and in the hour of death
by
Heinz Winbeck,
which reflects Bruckner's
Ninth Symphony
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Arvo Pärt began his choral composition
Da pacem Domine
(Give peace, Lord)
two days after the
2004 Madrid train bombings.
Max Reger composed
20
Responsories in English
for use in the American Lutheran church,
although he did not speak English.
Helene Wildbrunn,
a celebrated
Wagnerian soprano
at the
Vienna State Opera and
La Scala,
began her career in 1907 as a
contralto
at the
Stadttheater Dortmund.
Richard Wagner
(22 May 1813 - 13 February 1883)
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Alte Liebe (Old Love)
is a novel about a couple married for 40 years,
told by a couple married longer but separated,
with chapters written alternately
by
wife and
husband.
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After
George Alexander Albrecht
collapsed when conducting
Beethoven's Ninth Symphony
during a New Year's concert,
he returned to composing and began
hospice work.
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Hans-Dieter Bader
(16 February 1938 - 18 June 2022)
performed the title role
of Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari's opera
Sly,
recorded live at the
Staatsoper Hannover,
"as written", while
Plácido Domingo
had to cut and change the part.
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Concert venues of the
Rheingau Musik Festival
include
Eberbach Abbey,
Schloss Johannisberg
and
Lorch.
28 June 2023
Bach:
Mass in B minor
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Robert Hammerstiel
(18 February 1933 - 23 November 2020)
wrapped Vienna's
Ringturm tower
in a painting showing stations of human life
in simplified and brightly coloured figures.
"
Geh aus, mein Herz, und suche Freud",
written by
Paul Gerhardt
after the
Thirty Years War,
was translated as
"Go Forth, My Heart, and Seek Delight".
The journalist
Johann Georg Reißmüller
(20 February 1932 – 10 December 2018),
a co-publisher of
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung,
is credited with playing an important part
in Germany's recognition of
Croatia and
Slovenia.
Dutch baritone
John Bröcheler (born 1945)
first sang concerts including world premieres,
but was "discovered" for opera in a role
of Donizetti's
Maria Stuarda alongside
Joan Sutherland.
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Olivier Latry
(born 22 February 1962),
organist at
Notre-Dame de Paris,
played a concert at
St. Martin in
Lorch am Rhein in 2019.
For his ordination,
Georg Weissel wrote the text of the hymn
"
Such, wer da will, ein ander Ziel"
to
his friend's melody for a wedding song.
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Nele Hertling
(born 23 February 1934),
working for the
Academy of Arts, Berlin,
brought innovative culture to the city
including the
Tanz im August festival.
Tanz im August,
an annual international festival of
contemporary dance in Berlin,
was founded by
Nele Hertling in 1988.
The choral music of
Artemy Vedel,
who is regarded as one of the Golden Three composers of 18th-century
Ukrainian classical music,
was censored but performed from handwritten copies.
The 1885 spiritual anthem
Prayer for Ukraine
was performed by
Ukrainian Chorus Dumka of New York on
Saturday Night Live.
The 1641 edition
Selva morale e spirituale by
Claudio Monteverdi
is considered his
"most significant anthology of liturgical works
since the
Vespers in 1610".
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The art of
Ruth-Margret Pütz
(26 February 1930 – 1 April 2019)
a leading
coloratura soprano of the 1960s,
was published in a 2018 Recital,
including excerpts as
Konstanze and
Zerbinetta.
The 1885 spiritual anthem
Prayer for Ukraine
was performed by
Ukrainian Chorus Dumka of New York
on
Saturday Night Live.
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Max Reger's
Piano Concerto
was premiered by
Frieda Hodapp in 1910,
but has rarely been performed since, due to its difficulty.
The choral music of
Artemy Vedel,
who is regarded as one of the Golden Three composers
of 18th-century
Ukrainian classical music,
was censored but performed from handwritten copies.
Doris Stockhausen's
husband
dedicated several compositions to her,
beginning with
Chöre für Doris in 1950 before they married.
born 1924 · 28 February 2021
Elisabeth Waterhouse
founded the National Chamber Music Course summer school in 1974
and has managed it since.
born 1933 · 21 January 2023
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In 2005
composer
Krzysztof Penderecki
added a
Ciaccona for strings
to his
Polish Requiem,
begun in 1980.
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In 1524,
Elisabeth Cruciger's hymn
"
Herr Christ, der einig Gotts Sohn"
was the only song by a female author
published in the Lutheran hymnal
Erfurt Enchiridion.
The title page of the
Erfurt Enchiridion,
a
Lutheran
hymnal from 1524 with 26 songs,
recommends using the handbook
"for continuous practice and contemplation".
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The
Opernhaus Dortmund
was opened in 1966 with
Der Rosenkavalier,
performed in
Dortmund first in 1911.
Liselotte Hammes,
a soprano with the
Cologne Opera,
appeared as Sophie in
Der Rosenkavalier
at the
Glyndebourne Festival
alongside
Teresa Żylis-Gara in the title role
and
Montserrat Caballé as the Marschallin.
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The poet, cartoonist, and satirist
F. W. Bernstein
(4 March 1938 – 20 December 2018)
was appointed
professor of caricature and comics
in Berlin in 1984,
the only such chair in the world at the time.
The contralto
Elisabeth Schärtel,
known for performing many Wagner roles at the
Bayreuth Festival,
sang Verdi's
Meg Page alongside
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau as Falstaff.
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Siegfried Vogel
(born 6 March 1937),
a bass at the
Berlin State Opera from 1965,
appeared at the
Metropolitan Opera in New York
and at the
Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow
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Willigis Jäger
(7 March 1924 – 20 March 2020),
a German
Benedictine friar,
studied
Zen for six years with
Yamada Koun in Japan
and introduced it to his order.
Hans-Karl von Kupsch
(7 March 1937 – 26 April 2020),
who was instrumental in the unification
of the
East and West German booksellers' associations,
ran a gallery of contemporary art together with his wife.
Hana Blažíková
is a soprano
with the
Bach Collegium Japan,
conducted by
Masaaki Suzuki,
for the project to record the complete
Bach cantatas
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Azio Corghi
(9 March 1937 – 17 November 2022)
composed his second and third operas with author
José Saramago,
– the second for
La Scala in Milan,
and
the third for a 1993 premiere at the
Theater Münster
When the
Theater Münster opened in 1956,
it was regarded as the first new theatre in Germany
after World War II.
Delores Ziegler,
who teaches voice at the
University of Maryland,
appeared as Dorabella in Mozart's
Così fan tutte
for her debut at
La Scala, and in the film by
Ponnelle and
Harnoncourt.
John Rutter set
Psalm 23 in
The Lord is my Shepherd
for choir and organ,
and later included it in his
Requiem.
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Odile Pierre
(12 March 1932 – 29 February 2020),
who became interested in the organ
at a recital by
Marcel Dupré at the age of seven,
later served as the organist of
La Madeleine in Paris
and played around 2,000 recitals herself.
Hans Krieger
(13 March 1933 – 9 January 2023),
an
award-winning German
essayist,
influential in papers such as
Die Zeit,
wrote the text for a Christmas cantata
by
Graham Waterhouse that premieres today.
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Kyrie from Petite messe solennelle, premiered 14 March 1864 |
Rossini scored the last of his "sins of old age",
the
Petite messe solennelle
,
for twelve singers, two pianos, and
harmonium.
The German musicologist
Ludwig Finscher (14 March 1930 – 30 June 2020)
was the editor of
Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart,
an encyclopedia in 28 volumes, placing
music in cultural, social, and historical context.
Lorenzo Viotti
(born 15 March 1990)
conducted Massenet's
Werther
in three productions in opera houses of three countries in 2017,
silently singing with the soloists.
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Volodymyr Kozhukhar
(16 March 1941 – 3 December 2022),
the chief conductor of
the
National Opera of Ukraine in Kyiv,
led Lysenko's opera
Taras Bulba
and Shchedrin's ballet
Carmen Suite.
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Arvo Pärt composed the
motet
The Deer's Cry
on a commission from
Louth, Ireland,
setting the conclusion of
Saint Patrick's Breastplate,
"Christ with me".
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Christa Wolf
(18 March 1929 – 1 December 2011)
wrote
Der geteilte Himmel
in a "quest for personal integrity within a flawed system",
published in East Germany in 1963
and called a "socialist bestseller".
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The
Requiem
of
Max Reger
(19 March 1873 – 11 May 1916)
is a musical setting not of the Latin
Requiem,
but of a poem "Requiem"
written by the
dramatist
Friedrich Hebbel
When
Stefan Keil
(20 March 1958 – 16 December 2021)
moved to
Yekaterinburg, Russia, as the German consul general,
one of his first appearances was
at the European Christmas market, dressed as
Saint Nicholas.
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Johann Sebastian Bach
([O.S.] 21 March 1685 – 28 July 1750)
wrote around 200
cantatas in German but only one,
Gloria in excelsis Deo, BWV 191,
in
Latin.
Conductor
Helmuth Rilling,
Gächinger Kantorei and
Bach-Collegium Stuttgart
finished the first complete recording
of Bach's
cantatas and
oratorios
on the composer's 300th birthday, 21 March 1985.
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The soprano
Margit Bokor
created the role of Zdenka in
Arabella by Richard Strauss
at the
Semperoper in Dresden in 1933,
and performed the role
in the UK premiere at the
Royal Opera House.
Maria Friesenhausen
(23 March 1932 – 31 July 2020)
sang soprano solo with the
NDR Chor in the 1950s
and trained students of the
University of Dortmund
for an opera performance in 2001.
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Soprano
Annette Dasch
(born 24 March 1976)
appeared as Elettra in Mozart's
Idomeneo
at the reopening of the
Cuvilliés Theatre,
where that opera had been premiered in 1781.
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Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern, BWV 1
,
Bach's chorale cantata
for the feast of the
Annunciation,
was first performed on
Palm Sunday.
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Architect
Jörg Streli
(26 March 1940 – 13 February 2019)
and his two colleagues designed
the Sankt-Margarethen-Kapelle in
Tyrol,
which rises like a tower on a circular floor.
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The
Klassische Philharmonie Bonn,
a symphony orchestra founded and conducted
by
Heribert Beissel
(27 March 1933 – 11 June 2021),
has a tradition of playing a series of concerts
at more than ten major halls in Germany.
Tilge, Höchster, meine Sünden,
BWV 1083,
is a sacred vocal composition by
Johann Sebastian Bach,
a 1740s arrangement of Pergolesi's
Stabat Mater from 1736,
with a text from
Psalm 51.
The soprano
Leonore Kirschstein
(29 March 1933 – 26 February 2017)
appeared as Alice Ford,
with
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau as
Falstaff.
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Composer
Jan Müller-Wieland
(born 30 April 1966)
called his first stage work,
premiered at the
Munich Biennale in 1992,
a "
Cabaret
Farce for singers,
pianists and
percussionists".
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The
Munich Biennale
is an
opera festival created in 1988 by
Hans Werner Henze,
focused on opera premieres of young composers.
Composer
Jan Müller-Wieland
(born 30 April 1966)
called his first stage work,
premiered at the
Munich Biennale in 1992,
a "Cabaret Farce for singers, pianists and percussionists".
The soprano
Rotraud Hansmann
(born 1 April 1940)
performed six roles in three Monteverdi operas
conducted by
Nikolaus Harnoncourt,
including Euridice in
L'Orfeo.
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The
Alchymic Quartet
is a
string quartet by
Graham Waterhouse,
to be performed alongside chemical experiments
of
Andrew Szydlo,
his former teacher at
Highgate School.
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Renate Behle
(born 3 April 1945)
made her operatic debut in 1968
and appeared as Sara in the premiere of
Giorgio Battistelli's Lot
at the
Staatsoper Hannover in 2017.
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Hans-Karl von Kupsch,
who was instrumental in the unification
of the
East and West German booksellers' associations,
ran a gallery of contemporary art together with his wife.
Karlheinz Oswald created sculptures
of
Cardinal Volk,
Pierre de Coubertin and
Hildegard of Bingen.
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Marjon Lambriks
(born 5 April 1949),
who studied voice in the Netherlands
with
Paula Lindberg (both pictured)
and made a career in Vienna,
recorded
La traviata alongside
Pavarotti.
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In a motet for
Maundy Thursday,
Tristis est anima mea,
Jesus says in
Gethsemane
"
Sad is my soul even unto death".
Gottfried August Homilius wrote
Passions for Good Friday services
during his time as music director of
the
Church of the Holy Cross in Dresden.
Bach's
St Matthew Passion is structured
in 67 movements, according to the
NBA,
and tells the
Passion based on
the
Gospel of Matthew,
Picander's contemporary poetry, and chorales.
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A chorale fantasia on
"
O Mensch, bewein dein Sünde groß"
(O man, bewail thy sins so great)
by
Sebald Heyden
concludes Part I of
Bach's
St Matthew Passion.
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A 2009 recording of
Louis Vierne's
Messe solennelle
for choir and two organs at
Saint-Sulpice,
where it was first performed in 1901,
was called "musical and spiritual time-travel".
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The opening chorus of
Bach's
cantata for the
Second Day of Easter,
Erfreut euch, ihr Herzen, BWV 66
,
has been termed
"one of the longest and most exhilarating of Bach's early works".
Heinz Hennig
founded the
Knabenchor Hannover in 1950
and conducted the
boys' choir until 2001.
Günther Leib
(born 12 April 1927),
who often sang at the
Halle Handel Festival,
was called a "first rate
Beckmesser" by
The New York Times
when he first appeared at the
Metropolitan Opera.
"Handel's
Messiah
(premiered in Dublin on 13 April 1742)
is among the most frequently performed
and best-loved works in all choral music."
(
Brian Boulton,
2011)
Eleonore Schönborn
(14 April 1920 – 25 February 2022),
who had to
leave Czechoslovakia in 1945 with two young children,
received
an Austrian award in 2013
for cultural and social improvement.
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The melody of the Christian hymn
"
Ik sta voor U in leegte en gemis"
(I stand before You in emptiness and loss)
is sometimes printed without
bar lines,
reflecting the singer's insecurity and questions.
text by
Huub Oosterhuis
(1 November 1933 – 9 April 2023)
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Erich Korngold's opera
Die tote Stadt
had simultaneous premieres
in Cologne and Hamburg in 1920, one with
Johanna Geisler
as Marietta
and her husband
Otto Klemperer conducting.
Ik sta voor U in leegte en gemis
in memory of
Huub Oosterhuis
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The
Lichtental Church,
consecrated in 1730 to the
Fourteen Holy Helpers,
is known as the Schubertkirche,
because
Schubert was baptised
and conducted his
sacred music there.
Herr, unser Herr, wie bist du zugegen
in memory of
Huub Oosterhuis
A song of God's presence,
written in 1965 in Dutch by
Huub Oosterhuis,
became part of
the first common German Catholic hymnal,
and was retained in
the second by popular demand.
"
Herr, unser Herr, wie bist du zugegen"
is a German hymn translating a Dutch · "Lied van Gods aanwezigheid"
(song of God's presence)" written in 1965 by
Huub Oosterhuis.
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Composer
Graham Waterhouse was the
cellist
in a performance of his
string trio
Zeichenstaub
at his
former school,
playing the U.K. premiere
with two members of the
Münchner Philharmoniker.
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John Eliot Gardiner
(born 20 April 1943)
performed
Bach's cantatas for
Reformation Day
in the
Schloßkirche, Wittenberg,
as part of the
Bach Cantata Pilgrimage,
including
Gott der Herr ist Sonn und Schild, BWV 79.
The
art photographers
Anna and Bernhard Blume
created Kitchen Frenzy and Pure Reason.
(A.B. 21 April 1936 – 18 June 2020)
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For a rare performance of the
St Matthew Passion
by 18th-century composer
Homilius in 2023,
conductor
Clemens Bosselmann
had to track down handwritten sheet music.
Hans Uwe Hielscher played
the 1500th weekly organ recital during market time
at the
Marktkirche in Wiesbaden
in a series he initiated some 30 years earlier.
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Erhard Egidi
(23 April 1929 – 8 September 2014)
conducted at the
Neustädter Kirche both
the first performance after more than 300 years
of a funeral music by the church's first organist
and Bach's
Mass in B minor.
Tenor
Martin Petzold
(25 June 1955 – 19 April 2023)
a former member of the boys' choir
Thomanerchor,
was a singer of
Bach's Evangelist parts with the group.
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Matti Lehtinen
(24 April 1922 – 16 August 2022),
a
baritone of the
Finnish National Opera
and professor of singing at the
Sibelius Academy,
was the voice of God at age 93.
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The concert choir
Schiersteiner Kantorei,
founded 50 years ago in
Wiesbaden-
Schierstein,
performed Bach's
St Matthew Passion in the
Marktkirche.
Tenor
Martin Petzold
(25 June 1955 – 19 April 2023)
a former member of the boys' choir
Thomanerchor,
sang
Bach's Evangelist parts with the group.
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Contralto
Marga Höffgen
(26 April 1921 – 7 July 1995),
known as a Bach singer for
Karajan
and as
Erda in
Bayreuth,
recorded Max Reger's
Requiem compositions.
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Adalbert Kraus
(born 27 April 1937)
performed the tenor part
in Bach's
Easter Oratorio,
Kommt, eilet und laufet (Come, hasten and run).
Poèmes pour Mi
is a song cycle by
Olivier Messiaen
(10 December 1908 – 27 April 1992),
who set his own poems
for a
grand soprano dramatique and orchestra,
and dedicated it to
his wife.
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Giuseppe Verdi
combined in
Quattro pezzi sacri
four sacred vocal compositions,
including an
Ave Maria
on an
enigmatic scale for solo voices
and a
Te Deum.
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Hana Blažíková is a soprano
with the
Bach Collegium Japan, conducted by
Masaaki Suzuki
(born 29 April 1954),
for the project to record the complete
Bach cantatas.
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Bach was only in his twenties
when he composed the
cantata
Christ lag in Todes Banden, BWV 4,
for
Easter,
using in seven movements
the words and tune
of
Martin Luther's
Easter chorale.
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Francis Poulenc composed
Litanies à la Vierge Noire,
a French litany to the Black Virgin
at
Rocamadour,
after a pilgrimage to the shrine.
During the last decade,
Lance Ryan
(born 1 May 1971)
appeared as
Siegfried
at three
Bayreuth Festivals.
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Manfred Weiss,
who taught composition
at the
Musikhochschule Dresden
from 1959 to 1997,
composed a cantata after the
Book of Revelation
premiered by the
Dresdner Kreuzchor
conducted by
Roderich Kreile.
Hans Stadlmair
(3 May 1929 – 13 February 2019),
conductor of the
Münchener Kammerorchester for almost four decades,
in 1971 premiered
Wilhelm Killmayer's Fin al punto,
of which the composer said,
"The calm already contains the catastrophe".
The tenor
Kurt Huber
(born 4 May 1937)
sang the
Evangelist in
Bach's Ascension Oratorio
Lobet Gott in seinen Reichen, BWV 11,
composed for the feast of the
Ascension of 275 years ago.
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The 1965 song
"
Wie als een God wil leven",
written by
Huub Oosterhuis, was listed in 2013
as a hymn in German successful with young people.
The rhythm of
"
Solang es Menschen gibt auf Erden",
to a Dutch hymn translated into German,
has been compared to a
tango.
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Max Reger dedicated
Der Einsiedler
to conductor
Philipp Wolfrum and his choir,
but they performed the premiere only after the composer's death,
together with his
Requiem.
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The prolific composer
and
Westminster Cathedral conductor
Colin Mawby
(9 May 1936 – 24 November 2019)
said,
"I cannot write choral music
unless I work with choirs
... I have to write for particular people".
He wrote the Bonifatiusmess for the 150th anniversary of Chor von St. Bonifatius in Wiesbaden in 2012, then conducted by Gabriel Dessauer.
In one concert,
bassoonist
Lyndon Watts
premiered
Bernd Redmann's Migrant,
and played
Jörg Duda's first Finnish Quartet,
which he had commissioned,
and the
Bassoon Quintet of
Graham Waterhouse,
which he had premiered.
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The
late-Gothic church
St. Lamberti in
Hildesheim
was rebuilt after destruction in World War II,
but a southern annex was kept in ruins
as a memorial.
Raimund Hoghe
(12 May 1949 – 14 May 2021),
who was awarded the
German Dance Prize in 2020,
made a self-portrait documentary film Der Buckel (The Hunchback).
Kari Løvaas
(born 13 May 1939)
appeared in the premiere of Orff's
De temporum fine comoedia
at the
Salzburg Festival.
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Bach began his
cantata,
Wahrlich, wahrlich, ich sage euch, BWV 86,
(first performed on 14 May 1724),
with a quotation from the
Farewell discourse,
sung by the
bass as the
vox Christi.
The Polish
soprano
Zofia Kilanowicz
(born 15 May 1963)
appeared as Roxana in Szymanowski's
King Roger in Paris,
and recorded Górecki's
Symphony of Sorrowful Songs.
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Faustas Latėnas
(16 May 1956 – 3 November 2020),
vice-minister of Lithuania's
Ministry of Culture,
composed
incidental music, film scores,
and a
string quartet subtitled "In loving memory".
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Günter Wewel
(29 November 1934 – 9 May 2023),
for around 30 years
operatic bass
at the
Opernhaus Dortmund,
presented the television series
Kein schöner Land,
portraying regions in Europe filmed at the locations.
Bass-baritone
Stephen Varcoe
(born 19 May 1949)
recorded
Bach cantatas with the
Monteverdi Choir,
including
Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme, BWV 140.
Poetess
Christiana Mariana von Ziegler
ended her text for
Bach's cantata
Also hat Gott die Welt geliebt, BWV 68,
for
Pentecost Monday
with a quotation from the Gospel?
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The art of
Irma Blank,
of "drawing languages without words"
and including sounds,
was recognised in the 1970s
but fell into obscurity until a rediscovery in the 2010s.
Maria Mies
(6 February 1931 – 15 May 2023)
from a small village in the
Vulkaneifel
studied the position of women first in India
and cofounded
the first
women's shelter in Germany.
Johann Sebastian Bach reworked music
from more than three decades earlier
for the central piece Crucifixus
in the symmetrical structure of his
Mass in B minor.
Franz Schubert dedicated compositions to
Cathinka Buchwieser
(24 May 1789 – 9 July 1828),
a soprano who appeared in Vienna
as Mozart's
Sesto and
Elvira,
and as
Ferdinando Paer's Achille and
Leonora.
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Jubilate and
Te Deum
from the
Morning, Evening and Communion Service in B-flat
by
Charles Villiers Stanford
were first performed
in Cambridge
on 25 May 1879.
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The text for
Bach's last
cantata
in his second year in
Leipzig,
Es ist ein trotzig und verzagt Ding, BWV 176,
reflects the meeting of Jesus and
Nicodemus.
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The Easter composition
Surrexit a mortuis
(He rose from the dead)
was scored for choir and two organs
by
Charles-Marie Widor,
the organist at
Saint-Sulpice in Paris?
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Johann Sebastian Bach
marked to repeat the opening chorus
of the
cantata for
Pentecost,
Erschallet, ihr Lieder, erklinget, ihr Saiten!
BWV 172,
after the final chorale.
Poetess
Christiana Mariana von Ziegler
ended her text for
Bach's cantata
Also hat Gott die Welt geliebt, BWV 68,
for
Pentecost Monday
with a quotation from the Gospel.
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On 30 May 1723,
Johann Sebastian Bach
assumed the office of
Thomaskantor in Leipzig,
presenting his first new cantata,
Die Elenden sollen essen, BWV 75,
in the
St. Nicholas Church
on the first Sunday after
Trinity.
Mezzo-soprano
Eva Randová
was nominated for the
Laurence Olivier Award
for her performance as the Kostelnička Buryjovka
in Janáček's
Jenůfa at the
Royal Opera House.
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Javier Álvarez
(8 May 1956 – 23 May 2023)
composed his first
electroacoustic music,
Temazcal,
in 1984 while studying in London,
using a pair of
maracas
against a complex electroacoustic backdrop.
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The
Kölner Domchor
from the
Cologne Cathedral
sang Palmeri's
Misa a Buenos Aires
at a 2013 festival in Rome dedicated to
Pope Francis,
with the composer at the piano.
Michael Hampe
(3 June 1935 – 18 November 2022),
who directed the
Cologne Opera for 20 years,
was the stage director for the world premiere
of
Henze's adaptation of Monteverdi's
Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria
at the
Salzburg Festival
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Erasmus Schöfer
(4 June 1931 – 7 June 2022)
chronicled the resistance in Germany,
from the
protests of 1968
to
German reunification,
in a
tetralogy of novels.
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In Strauss'
Elektra,
Aile Asszonyi
was said to be convincing
as a woman close to madness.
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Bach has
a trumpet tell God's glory in
cantata
Die Himmel erzählen die Ehre Gottes, BWV 76,
first performed in the
Thomaskirche
on 6 June 1723,
but
oboe d'amore and
viola da gamba
express "brotherly devotion".
Kurt Widmer
(28 December 1940 – 31 May 2023),
a baritone and influential professor
in Basel,
sang as a soloist with
Gemischter Chor Zürich between 1967 and 1992,
from Bach's
Gott der Herr ist Sonn und Schild, BWV 79,
to Suter's
Le Laudi,
and recorded new
song cycles by
György Kurtág.
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Mozart composed his motet
Ave verum corpus
for the church choir of
St. Stephan in Baden
on 17 June 1791,
for the
Feast of Corpus Christi.
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Haroun and the Sea of Stories,
an opera by
Charles Wuorinen
(9 June 1938 – 11 March 2020),
is based on a children's novel
by
Salman Rushdie
about free imagination in battle with thought control.
Hanns-Martin Schneidt
became head of
an academy of church music in 1955 at age 25,
of the
Münchener Bach-Chor in 1984,
and of a
symphony orchestra in Japan in 2007.
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Jesu, meine Freude
(Jesus, my joy),
a
motet by Bach,
has a complex symmetrical structure
in which six
hymn stanzas
alternate with five
Bible verses.
"
Geh aus, mein Herz, und suche Freud",
written by
Paul Gerhardt
after the
Thirty Years War,
was translated as
"Go forth, my heart, and seek delight".
Tenor
Kurt Equiluz
(13 June 1929 – 20 June 2022)
was the Evangelist
in the first
recording of Bach's
St John Passion
on
period instruments with the
Concentus Musicus Wien, Vienna.
Mezzo-soprano
Hedwig Fassbender,
who also appeared in soprano roles such as Wagner's
Isolde,
has been an influential voice teacher in
Frankfurt.
The
oboist and composer
Rolf Riehm
(born 15 June 1937)
taught music theory
in Frankfurt from 1974 to 2000
and wrote an opera,
Sirenen, for a 2014 premiere at the
Oper Frankfurt.
In 2016
Pascal Rophé
conducted works by
Henri Dutilleux
to celebrate the composer's centenary,
including
Tout un monde lointain... and
Le temps l'horloge.
The
bass-baritone
Albert Dohmen
(born 17 June 1956)
appeared as Berg's
Wozzeck at the
Salzburg Festival in 1997,
and as Wagner's
Pogner at
La Scala in 2017.
Jörg Faerber
(18 June 1929 – 13 September 2022)
was the artistic director of the
Württemberg Chamber Orchestra Heilbronn
for more than four decades
and recorded piano concertos by
Shostakovich and
Haydn with
Martha Argerich.
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With compositions such as
Con brio
and
Babylon,
clarinetist
Jörg Widmann
(born 19 June 1973)
was ranked the third-most-performed
contemporary composer in 2018.
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In his
Viola Sonata
entitled Sonata ebraica (Hebrew Sonata),
Graham Waterhouse quotes the Yiddish song
"
Oyfn Pripetshik".
Gabriele Schnaut
(24 February 1951 – 19 June 2023)
recorded alto parts in
Bach cantatas in the 1970s,
and appeared as Waltraute and Second Norne
in the
Jahrhundertring film in 1980,
as
Isolde in 1985,
and as
Turandot in 2002.
Cornel Țăranu
(20 June 1934 – 18 June 2023),
a Romanian composer, musicologist and
conductor of a
chamber orchestra for
contemporary music,
completed unfinished scores by
George Enescu.
Josef Protschka, who sang as a soloist
in Stockhausen's
Gesang der Jünglinge
at age 12, later appeared in leading
tenor roles
in the Mozart cycle staged by
Jean-Pierre Ponnelle at the
Cologne Opera.
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The concert venues of the
Rheingau Musik Festival
have included
Eberbach Abbey,
Schloss Johannisberg and
St. Martin, Lorch,
from the beginning.
The Company of Heaven,
Benjamin Britten's 1937 composition
about angels
for speakers, soloists, choir and orchestra,
contains "metrical spoken (shouted) male chorus".
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Alte Liebe (Old Love)
is a novel about a couple married for 40 years,
told by a couple married longer but separated,
with chapters written alternately
by
Elke Heidenreich and
Bernd Schroeder
(6 June 1944 – 18 June 2023).
Karlheinz Stockhausen dedicated several compositions to
Doris Stockhausen
(28 February 1924 – 20 June 2023)
beginning with
Chöre für Doris in 1950
before they married.
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Johann Sebastian Bach
reworked music from
more than three decades earlier
for the central piece
Crucifixus
in the symmetrical structure of his
Mass in B minor.
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International opera singer
Soňa Červená
won the
Alfréd Radok Award for Best Actress
when she was 83 years old.
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The 1968 album
Machine Gun by
Peter Brötzmann
(6 March 1941 – 22 June 2023),
titled after his nickname, became
"one of the landmark albums
of 20th-century free jazz".
Benjamin Britten wrote out the
Latin text for
Cantata academica,
commissioned by
Paul Sacher for the quincentenary of the
University of Basel
and premiered 1 July 1960,
in one of his old German
exercise books.
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The
Missa brevis in B-flat,
a
mass for mixed choir, trumpets, trombones,
tubular bells and organ
by
Christopher Tambling,
was premiered by 1,400 singers
at
St. Maria in Landau in 2014.
Rachel Yakar
(3 March 1936 – 24 June 2023),
a French
soprano based for decades at the
Deutsche Oper am Rhein,
appeared in the title role of Monteverdi's
L'incoronazione di Poppea
in the
Oper Zürich production and film
conducted by
Nikolaus Harnoncourt.
Countertenor
Christopher Lowrey
took part in the world premiere of Brett Dean's
Hamlet
in
Glyndebourne in 2017,
and moved with the production to Australia
and the
Metropolitan Opera.
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Diana Tishchenko,
a violinist from Ukraine,
played Skoryk's
Melody
on a tour of the
Kyiv Symphony Orchestra
to Germany
in April 2022.
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In 2016,
Edition Güntersberg
published
12 Fantasias for Viola da Gamba
by
Telemann
that had been lost.
Wolkentanz,
a leading
Hanoverian stallion at the
Celle State Stud,
sired 21 licensed stallions.
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The
Twelve Fantasias for Viola da Gamba solo,
published by the composer
Georg Philipp Telemann in 1735, were believed lost
but published again in 2016.
Leonore von Zadow-Reichling and Günter von Zadow
received the first biennial
Abel Prize of
Köthen
for their efforts to retrieve and publish
compositions by
Carl Friedrich Abel.
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The
a cappella
ensemble amarcord,
five former members of the
Thomanerchor,
won the
CARA award "Best classical album"
again in 2010,
for Rastlose Liebe (Restless Love).
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In
Bio's Bahnhof,
a German live music talk show
presented by
Alfred Biolek
(10 July 1934 – 23 July 2021)
in a former train depot,
Kate Bush made her first television appearance.
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Frank Beermann
conducted the first recording
of
Bruno Maderna's Requiem,
the German premiere
of Péter Eötvös's opera
Love and Other Demons
at the
Chemnitz Opera,
and Beethoven's
Fidelio in 2021.
Director
Frank Stähle
(12 July 1942 – 10 December 2015)
revived the choir and orchestra
of
Dr. Hoch's Konservatorium
and conducted them in
Mozart's Requiem
for the centenary of the
Lutherkirche
in Wiesbaden.
The string quintet Haven of Mysteries
by
Anthony Gilbert
(26 July 1934 – 5 July 2023),
who taught composition both
at the
Royal Northern College of Music and in Australia,
was premiered with the
Arditti Quartet in
Wigmore Hall in 2015.
Graham Clark
(10 November 1941 – 6 July 2023)
appeared at the
Bayreuth Festival in 16 seasons,
in 1988 as Loge and Mime in the
Ring cycle conducted by Daniel Barenboim.
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Violeta Hemsy de Gainza
(25 January 1929 – 7 July 2023),
president of the
Latin American Forum of Musical Education
from its foundation in 1995,
taught generations of students, and said:
"Learning music is a human right".
The title role of
Boris Blacher's last opera,
Yvonne, Prinzessin von Burgund,
is performed by a mute dancer.
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Johann Sebastian Bach
may have reused earlier music
for his
cantata
Erforsche mich, Gott, und erfahre mein Herz,
BWV 136,
for the eighth Sunday after
Trinity
on 18 July 1723.
Martin Janus
wrote the original lyrics of "Jesu, meiner Seelen Wonne",
which Bach used in
Herz und Mund und Tat und Leben, BWV 147,
in a setting known as
Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring.
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When
Heide Simonis
(4 July 1943 – 12 July 2023),
minister of finance in
Schleswig-Holstein from 1988,
became
minister-president there,
she was the first woman to serve
as head of a state government in Germany.
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The walls of the
Kronberg Academy's
Casals Forum,
opened in 2022,
are curved and covered with wood in a manner
reminiscent of a string instrument.
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The
Empress Elisabeth Bridge ,
a 1855
chain bridge over the
Elbe
connecting
Tetschen
to the railroad to
Dresden,
was named in honor of the newly married
Elisabeth of Austria.
Valentin Gheorghiu
(21 March 1928 – 17 July 2023),
later pianist and composer,
won the prize for the best performance
of Enescu's
Violin Sonata No. 3
at the first
George Enescu International Competition
in 1958, with his brother
Ștefan as the violinist.
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Singers
Anne Sofie von Otter and
Christian Gerhaher
(born 24 July 1969)
recorded music written in
the
concentration camp of Terezín
by artists such as
Ilse Weber,
Hans Krása,
Pavel Haas and
Viktor Ullmann.
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After
Tenebrae
received the
Rheingau Musikpreis
during a concert at
Eberbach Abbey,
they performed Talbot's
Path of Miracles,
a 2005 one-hour work for choir
a cappella
inspired by the
Camino de Santiago.
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Romanian
musicologist
Cornel Țăranu
(20 June 1934 – 18 June 2023)
completed unfinished scores by
George Enescu
that Enescu did not wish to publish.
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In 1973
Luten Petrowsky
played the saxophone in a quartet
that made the first record
with jazz musicians from
both East and West Germany.
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Silvana Lattmann,
biologist, poet and author,
published the memoir
Nata il 1918
in 2019.
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Rhythm Is It!
is a 2004 documentary film
about 250 public school students
trained by
Royston Maldoom to dance
Stravinsky's
Le Sacre du printemps
with the
Berlin Philharmonic.
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Paul Gerhardt's song
of thanks and praise
"
Nun danket all und bringet Ehr"
was first published
along with 17 of his other hymns
in 1647,
during the
Thirty Years' War.
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A French team,
with
Patrice Chéreau and
Pierre Boulez,
created the
Jahrhundertring
of
Richard Wagner's
Ring cycle
at the centenary
Bayreuth Festival in 1976,
causing "a near-riot".
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Martin Walser's
Ein fliehendes Pferd
(Runaway Horse),
his most successful book with readers and critics,
was adapted for the screen
in 1986 by
Peter Beauvais,
and again in 2007 by
Rainer Kaufmann.
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Andris Nelsons conducted
Bartok's
Viola Concerto
and
Mahler's
Fifth Symphony
in the final concert with his
Nordwestdeutsche Philharmonie.
pictured:
Jonathon Heyward announcing on 3 March 2022
at the
Stadttheater Minden that the concert
(which included Stavinsky's
The Firebird)
was dedicated to
the victims of the Russian invasion into Ukraine
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Kaiser Wilhelm II
called the
Kurhaus in
Wiesbaden
"the most beautiful spa in the world"
at the opening ceremony.
Beethoven: Violin Concerto
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Felix Mendelssohn
first composed the
motet
Denn er hat seinen Engeln befohlen
(For He shall give His angels charge)
for an eight-part choir,
then included it with orchestra
in
Elijah.
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Nancy Van de Vate's opera
Quiet at the Western Front
was performed at the
New York City Opera.
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After the Ukrainian soprano
Olga Bezsmertna
(born 6 August 1983)
won the
Neue Stimmen competition in 2011,
she was engaged at the
Vienna State Opera.
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Igor Stravinsky
said of his cousin and first wife,
Yekaterina "Katya",
that they were
"closer than lovers sometimes are".
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Mariana Sîrbu,
who played first violin in a string quartet
that she founded as a student in Bucharest in 1967
and moved to Ireland,
was
concertmaster of
I Musici from 1993 to 2003.
The conductor of the
Leningrad premiere of Shostakovich's Symphony No. 7
on 9 August 1942 while the city was
under siege,
performed by the surviving musicians of the
Leningrad Radio Orchestra
supplemented with military performers, concluded:
"we triumphed over the soulless Nazi war machine".
Klesie Kelly,
soprano and academic voice teacher in Cologne,
recorded love songs for voices and instrumental soloists
with tenor
Ian Partridge.
Soprano
Heidi Grant Murphy,
who has given over 200 performances at the
Metropolitan Opera,
said that becoming a singer
"takes work on your psyche, your innermost being".
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The
Überwasserkirche,
a Gothic
hall church in
Münster,
was the location
of the second of three sermons held in 1941
by Bishop
Clemens August Graf von Galen
in defiance of the Nazi regime.
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The "extreme lightness and luminous agility" of
Michael McCown's voice
in the roles of
Britten's
Tempter and
Nebuchadnezzar
has been likened to that of
Peter Pears.
Countertenor
David Erler
was one of five singers invited by
amarcord
for the performance of Monteverdi's
Vespers
as the annual Marienvesper
of the
Rheingau Musik Festival in
Eberbach Abbey.
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After an absence of four years,
the
Inkpot Madonna,
holding a naked Baby Jesus with quill in hand,
returns to the
Hildesheim Cathedral today.
Countertenor
David Erler
was one of five singers invited by
amarcord
for the performance of Monteverdi's
Vespers
as the annual Marienvesper
of the
Rheingau Musik Festival in
Eberbach Abbey.
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Hans-Jochen Jaschke,
who was responsible
for
ecumenism and
inter-religious dialogue
as an
auxiliary bishop of Hamburg,
represented the
Catholic Church
in the media.
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Marie Lehmann,
one of the
Rhinemaidens
at the first
Bayreuth Festival
(13–17 August 1876),
sang the soprano solo
in Beethoven's
Ninth Symphony
for the groundbreaking
of the
Bayreuth Festival Theatre.
Soprano
Rosa Lamoreaux,
who recorded Bach's
Mass in B minor
with
The Bach Choir of Bethlehem and at the
Carmel Bach Festival,
won the 2009 Washington Area Music Award as classical vocal soloist.
Mahler: Second Symphony
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Vilde Frang
(born 19 August 1986)
played Sarasate's
Carmen Fantasy,
with
Mariss Jansons
conducting the
Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra,
at age 13.
Mahler: Fourth Symphony
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Renata Scotto
made her opera debut as
La traviata in Milan,
portrayed
Madama Butterfly
for her debut at the
Met,
and was
Mimi
in the first
Live from the Met telecast
in 1977, alongside
Luciano Pavarotti.
Hans Stadlmair, conductor of the
Münchener Kammerorchester
for almost four decades, in 1971 premiered
Wilhelm Killmayer's Fin al punto,
of which the composer said,
"The calm already contains the catastrophe".
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Claude Debussy
(22 August 1862 – 25 March 1918)
described his
Cello Sonata,
composed within a few weeks
in July 1915 at a
Normandy seaside town,
in a letter to his publisher
Durand
as of "almost classical form".
Vera Nemirova
staged
Lulu at the
Salzburg Festival
and
The Ring for the
Oper Frankfurt.
Conductor
Roland Bader
(born 24 August 1938)
recorded late choral works by
Max Reger,
including his
Hebbel Requiem,
and the First Symphony by
Richard Wetz.
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Thomas Gabriel
(born 25 August 1957)
composed the Missa mundi
for the 2005
World Youth Day,
representing the continents
in style and instrumentation
with
pan flute,
sitar,
drums and
didgeridoo.
Soon after starting her career at the
Metropolitan Opera,
Gwendolyn Killebrew
(August 26, 1941 – December 24, 2021)
appeared as a valkyrie in Wagner's
Die Walküre
in a live broadcast
alongside
Birgit Nilsson in the title role.
Mahler: Ninth Symphony
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The First Symphony "Music on Open Strings"
by
Gloria Coates
was the first composition by a woman
in the Musica Viva series of
Bayerischer Rundfunk.
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Rehearsing
Dvořák's Eighth Symphony,
conductor
Rafael Kubelík said:
"Gentlemen,
in Bohemia
the trumpets never call to battle –
they always call to the dance!".
heard 2013
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When
Berit Lindholm
(18 October 1934 – 12 August 2023),
a
dramatic soprano of the
Royal Swedish Opera,
appeared as
Chrysothemis
at the
Royal Opera House,
a reviewer described her as
"tall, and remarkably slim for so epic a voice".
Berit Lindholm
performed as Wagner's
Isolde
at the
Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow
in a pioneering tour of the
Vienna State Opera
in 1971.
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Beethoven's
Third Cello Sonata,
first performed in 1809,
has been described
as the first sonata for piano and cello
to treat the instruments as equal partners.
16 December 2020
(quirky in the all-Beethoven set)
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Of thrice-married composer
Alma Mahler
(31 August 1879 – 11 December 1964)
Tom Lehrer crooned,
"Alma, tell us!
All modern women are jealous
Which of your magical wands
got you
Gustav and
Walter and
Franz".
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Le Vin herbé,
a 1942 composition by
Frank Martin
of the
Tristan and Iseult story
for twelve vocalists,
seven
strings and
piano,
was staged at the 1948
Salzburg Festival.
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The concert venues of the
Rheingau Musik Festival
have included
Eberbach Abbey
from the beginning,
where the final concert of 2023
is Bruckner's
Seventh Symphony
played by the
Gewandhausorchester
conducted by
Herbert Blomstedt
(born 1927).
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Giuseppe Verdi's
secular cantata
Inno delle nazioni,
his first collaboration with
Arrigo Boito,
contains three national anthems.
In her 2021 composition with string orchestra
This too shall pass
Raminta Šerkšnytė used
a
vibraphone for the flow of time,
a violin for the transience of humans,
and a "heavenly" cello.
When
Robert Hale
appeared as Wagner's
Wotan at the
Kennedy Center in 1989,
a reviewer noted that he captured "the spirit,
from tragic grandeur to ironic detachment,
from flooding tenderness to grim rage".
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Nerotalanlagen,
a park along a creek in
Wiesbaden,
was built in the late 19th century
to enhance the town's spa quality.
Milka Stojanović,
prima donna at the
National Theatre in Belgrade from 1960 to 1993,
performed the
Verdian repertoire worldwide,
including
Leonora,
Amelia and
Aida
at the
Metropolitan Opera.
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Concerts of the
Spannungen
festival of chamber music,
founded by pianist
Lars Vogt
(8 September 1970 – 5 September 2022)
in 1998, are played in a power plant.
The
dramatic soprano
Ute Vinzing
(born 9 September 1936)
made her debut at the
Metropolitan Opera as
Elektra,
and appeared as Brünnhilde in Wagner's
Ring cycle
in Seattle.
Dramatic soprano
Ursula Schröder-Feinen
appeared at the
Bayreuth Festival
as
Senta,
Brünnhilde,
Ortrud and,
with "intensity, ... freshness and spontaneity", as Kundry in
Parsifal.
Walter Arlen
(July 31, 1920 – September 2, 2023),
who escaped the Nazi regime in Vienna
for the United States in 1939,
enjoyed the first recording of his compositions, for voice and piano, at age 92.
Anatol Ugorski
(28 September 1942 – 5 September 2023),
who had played piano music by controversial Western composers
such as
Pierre Boulez in the Soviet Union,
made his first recording, of Beethoven's
Diabelli Variations, in 1991.
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The pianist
Clara Schumann,
(13 September 1819 – 20 May 1896)
who toured Europe for decades,
taught 68 students at
Dr. Hoch's,
including those from Britain and the U.S..
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Margherita Rinaldi
(12 January 1935 – 7 September 2023)
made her debut as Donizetti's
Lucia di Lammermoor in 1958,
prompting a career at
La Scala in Milan where she appeared
as Giulietta in Bellini's
I Capuleti e i Montecchi
alongside
Luciano Pavarotti.
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Soprano
Jessye Norman
(15 September 1945 – 30 September 2019),
whose voice was described
as a "grand mansion of sound",
performed at
U.S. presidential inaugurations
and sang
La Marseillaise
at the
French Revolution's bicentennial.
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Wolfgang J. Fuchs
(16 September 1945 – 20 January 2020),
an early German
comics scholar
who co-wrote a 1971 standard work on the topic,
translated
Garfield
and
Mom's Cancer.
The
tenor
Graham Clark
appeared at the
Bayreuth Festival in 16 seasons,
portraying the characters Loge and Mime
in the 1988
Ring cycle.
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Grischa Huber
(18 September 1944 – 6 April 2021)
played Grischa in
Under the Pavement Lies the Strand,
regarded as
"a cult film in the feminist movement".
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After the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
shared the
Nobel Peace Prize, contributing author
Raymond Arritt
(September 19, 1957 – November 14, 2018)
said, "It's kind of neat:
I have, like, .002 percent of a Nobel prize now".
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Georg Christoph Biller (r.)
(20 September 1955 – 27 January 2022)
was the
Thomaskantor,
the conductor of the Thomanerchor in Leipzig,
the 16th successor of
Johann Sebastian Bach
in this position.
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Elisabeth Rethberg
(22 September 1894 – 6 June 1976)
a
soprano
whose career began in Saxony,
became
Aida
at
La Scala in Milan,
conducted by
Toscanini.
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With the growth of the
Werl pilgrimage
to a statue of
Mary,
a large
Romanesque Revival basilica
was built adjacent to
the former
Baroque church (pictured).
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For the morning song
"
Die güldne Sonne
voll Freud und Wonne",
the poet found a new
metre,
and
the composer a new melody,
to reflect the many meanings of "rising".
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Stephen Gould,
an American
heldentenor,
performed around 100 times at the
Bayreuth Festival,
especially as
Tannhäuser,
Siegfried, and
Tristan,
all three even in one year in 2022.
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A
loop from the anthem
O clap your hands,
a setting of verses from
Psalm 47
by
Ralph Vaughan Williams
for choir, brass, organ and percussion,
was used by the Beatles for "
Revolution 9".
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Kloster Gnadenthal
(buildings pictured)
was a
Cistercian nunnery from 1235,
a Protestant women's
Stift from 1564,
and became an ecumenical community
in 1969.
François Glorieux
(27 August 1932 – 22 September 2023)
was a Belgian pianist and improvisor, touring with
André Cluytens,
conductor of the
BBC Radio Orchestra, the
Stan Kenton band,
and four ensembles that he founded,
composer, and arranger for
Michael Jackson.
The Company of Heaven,
about angels, composed by
Benjamin Britten
for speakers, soloists, choir and orchestra,
and first aired by the
BBC on
Michaelmas,
29 September 1937,
contains "metrical spoken (shouted) male chorus".
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The
Kreuzkapelle
above
Bad Camberg,
a pilgrimage chapel
dedicated to the
Holy Cross,
has a floor plan of a
Greek cross.
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"
Wir pflügen und wir streuen"
('We plow and sow'),
with words by
Matthias Claudius,
began as a song of a fictional harvest festival,
and is now a Protestant hymn
for
Erntedankfest.
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Dona nobis pacem
is a
cantata by
Ralph Vaughan Williams,
first performed on 2 October 1936,
a plea for peace with texts taken
from the
Mass, poems by
Walt Whitman,
a political speech, and sections of the Bible.
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Haydn's oratorio
The Creation
is
structured in three parts,
the first two about
the
creation as narrated in Genesis,
and the third about
Adam and Eve in
Paradise.
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Swiss composer
Hermann Suter's
symphonic
oratorio
Le Laudi
(The Praises)
is a setting of
St. Francis of Assisi's
Italian
Canticle of the Sun
for choir, soloists,
voci di ragazzi,
organ and orchestra.
Tenor
Daniel Behle
had a single day to learn rarely performed
romantic duets
when he stepped in at short notice
for a 2018
Rheingau Musik Festival concert with
Annette Dasch.
Claus Wisser
founded the services company Wisag,
and co-founded the
Rheingau Musik Festival
which staged a concert of Orff's
Carmina Burana for his 60th birthday.
Russell Sherman, a classical pianist
who taught at the
New England Conservatory for more than half a century,
wrote about music by
Franz Liszt:
"The poetic idea is central, and the virtuoso elements
become so many layers to orchestrate the poetic content".
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Tabea Zimmermann
(born 8 October 1966)
prepared her own version of Bartók's
Viola Concerto
from the composer's sketches,
and played it at the
Casals Forum,
with the
Frankfurt Radio Symphony
conducted by
Christoph Eschenbach.
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Alain Altinoglu
(born 9 October 1975)
conducted the opening concert of the
2023
Rheingau Musik Festival
at
Eberbach Abbey,
featuring Poulenc's
Stabat Mater
with the
MDR Rundfunkchor
and the
Frankfurt Radio Symphony.
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The
baritone
Björn Bürger
(born 10 October 1985),
who won the
Bundeswettbewerb Gesang Berlin in 2012,
performed the title role
in Arnulf Herrmann's
Der Mieter
in its 2017 world premiere
at the
Oper Frankfurt.
Jacqueline Dark,
a
mezzo-soprano with
Opera Australia for a while,
won awards for portraying Mozart's
Donna Elvira and Strauss's
Herodias,
and toured Australia and New Zealand
as Mother Abbess in
The Sound of Music,
with "a stunning rendition of '
Climb Ev'ry Mountain'".
Reiner Goldberg,
a
heldentenor who performed
Wagner-roles worldwide,
was a member of the
Berlin State Opera from 1972,
appeared as Aron in the iconic production
of Schoenberg's
Moses und Aron
of the
Dresden State Opera in 1975,
and sang
Parsifal in the
1982 Syberberg film
"with a youthful radiance
that is precisely that of the chaste madman".
Maurice Bourgue.
principal oboist with the
Orchestre de Paris from its foundation in 1967,
and professor of
chamber music at the
Conservatoire de Paris,
played in world premieres such as Les Citations by
Henri Dutilleux,
and Poulenc's
Oboe Sonata with friends.
When
Robert Hale
performed as
Wagner's Wotan in Washington,
a reviewer noted that he commanded
"the spirit, from tragic grandeur to ironic detachment,
from flooding tenderness to grim rage".
Jorge Lavelli
introduced the French audience to the Polish playwright
Witold Gombrowicz,
directing his
The Marriage in 1963 for a competition,
and his 1975 staging of Gounod's
Faust for the
Paris Opera,
set during World War I, was played until 2003.
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"
Glauben können wie du"
(Believing like you),
a hymn by
Helmut Schlegel,
is addressed to
Mary,
and relates to her exemplary
faith, hope and love.
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Tenor
Thomas Mohr,
who sang the roles
of Loge, Siegmund, and Siegfried
in
Der Ring in Minden,
and Florestan in
Fidelio in Hamm,
hosts concerts in his cowshed.
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Walls and the ceiling of the
Unionskirche
(Union Church)
in
Idstein are covered
with 38 oil paintings
from the
Dutch Golden Age school
of
Rubens.
To include the popular
Marian hymn
"
Maria zu lieben, ist allzeit mein Sinn"
(To love Mary is always on my mind)
in
the first common Catholic hymnal in German,
Friedrich Dörr retained only its first line.
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In 2023,
a sculpture garden in
Praunheim
displayed abstract works by
Hans Steinbrenner
from different periods of his life,
and corresponding works
by his friends and students.
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"'"
("Call it causelessly merry")
was one of about 40 poems
by
Mascha Kaléko
set to music on a 2011 album.
"Ich freu mich, daß am Himmel Wolken ziehen"
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The opening chorus
of
Bach's cantata
Schmücke dich, o liebe Seele, BWV 180,
has been regarded as
"perfectly tailored to the idea of the soul
dressing itself up in all its wedding finery".
Hatto Beyerle,
the founding violist of the
Alban Berg Quartet,
taught
chamber music in
Vienna,
Hannover and
Basel,
and initiated and directed the
European Chamber Music Academy in 2004.
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Carmen Petra Basacopol
a musicologist who taught
at the
National University of Music Bucharest
between 1962 and 2003,
and at the Rabat Conservatoire,
composed operas for children
and chamber music for flute and harp.
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Elsa Reger
(25 October 1870 – 3 May 1951),
who had first rejected
Max Reger's courting,
titled her autobiography
Mein Leben mit und für Max Reger
(My life with and for Max Reger).
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Pianist
Miku Nishimoto-Neubert,
a prize winner
of the
Leipzig Bach Competition,
has been described as
"moving between capricious high spirits
and a meditative inwardness"
Alkan: Cello Sonata
Michael Schneider
conducted an oratorio by
Alessandro Stradella,
performed by students and teachers of the
Frankfurt University of Music
at
Eberbach Abbey for the
Rheingau Musik Festival.
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Isabelle Cals,
who turned to singing after a degree in Chinese,
appeared as Wagner's Kundry
in a production of
Parsifal
at the
Stadttheater Minden
In
Der Ring in Minden,
the orchestra played at the back of the stage,
and the singers all turned towards it
to listen to the music
at the end.
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Percy Grainger,
who left Australia at the age of 13
to attend
Hoch's Conservatorium,
played a prominent role in the revival
of interest in British folk music
in the course of a long and innovative career.
István Láng,
an Hungarian composer,
teacher of
chamber music at the
Franz Liszt Academy of Music
and member of the bord of
ISCM,
wrote theatrical music even in concert pieces.
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John Eliot Gardiner performed
Bach's cantatas for
Reformation Day
in the
Schloßkirche, Wittenberg,
including
Gott der Herr ist Sonn und Schild, BWV 79.
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Herr, unser Herr, wie bist du zugegen,
a "song of God's presence"
written in 1965 in Dutch
by
Huub Oosterhuis
(1 November 1933 – 9 April 2023),
became part of
the first
common German Catholic hymnal,
and was retained in
the second
by popular demand.
After signing the
Camp David Accords in 1978,
Prime Minister
Menachem Begin ended a speech
with a desire to sing the peace song
"
Hevenu shalom aleichem"
with the people of Israel.
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Zdeněk Mácal,
a promising Czech conductor,
left his home country in 1968
and was chief conductor of orchestras
in Germany, Australia and the United States,
returning to Prague to lead
the
Czech Philharmonic from 2003.
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Jesu, meine Freude
(Jesus, my joy),
a
motet by Bach,
has a complex symmetrical structure
in which six
hymn stanzas
alternate with five
Bible verses.
The hymn
"
Jesu, meine Freude"
by
Johann Franck and
Johann Crüger
mentions singing in defiance
of the "old dragon", death, and fear.
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On 6 November 2016
Peter Reulein conducted
the premiere of his oratorio
Laudato si',
described as a Franciscan
Magnificat,
with more than 250 performers
at the
Limburg Cathedral.
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Bach composed four dialogues
for his
cantata
O Ewigkeit, du Donnerwort, BWV 60,
first performed 7 November 1723,
three between Fear and Hope,
and one between Fear and the
Voice of Christ.
Eric Sams remarked
"what bride ever had a finer wedding gift?"
of the song collection
Myrthen (Myrtles),
which
Robert Schumann dedicated to
Clara.
Astrid Schirmer
(born 8 November 1942)
appeared in roles by Richard Wagner,
both Venus and Elisabeth in his
Tannhäuser,
and in the Bayreuth
Jahrhundertring as both Ortlinde and Sieglinde.
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In the fairy-tale opera
Der Schuhu und die fliegende Prinzessin
by
Udo Zimmermann,
two orchestras play on stage,
representing two empires in conflict.
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The first stanza of the
hymn
"
Nun bitten wir den Heiligen Geist",
asking the
Holy Spirit
for the right faith most of all,
is documented in German
in the 13th century,
and the later three,
by
Martin Luther
(10 November 1483 – 18 February 1546),
relate to
faith, love and hope.
|
11 November - St. Martin's Day
Two
conductors
shared performances
of Verdi's
Messa da Requiem
in
St. Martin, Idstein.
Mozart: Lacrymosa
Harald Heckmann
(6 December 1924 – 5 November 2023),
a German
musicologist focused on source documentation,
established the German Archive for the History of Music
and promoted international exchange in leading positions
of
Répertoire International des Sources Musicales (RISM)
and many other organisations.
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"
Mir nach, spricht Christus, unser Held"
(Follow me, says Christ, our hero)
is a
Christian hymn in German
with a text by
Angelus Silesius
that uses sayings of
Jesus in
direct speech.
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In 2016,
Edition Güntersberg
published
Twelve Fantasias for Viola da Gamba solo
by
Georg Philipp Telemann
that had been lost.
Leonore von Zadow-Reichling and Günter von Zadow (r.)
received the first biennial
Abel Prize of
Köthen
for their efforts to retrieve and publish
compositions by
Carl Friedrich Abel.
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Kurdish civil engineer and politician
Hevrin Khalaf
(15 November 1984 – 12 October 2019) ,
who worked for tolerance
among Christians, Arabs, and Kurds,
was killed in the
2019 Turkish offensive into Syria.
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The 1964 church
for the new parish
Zu den heiligen Engeln
(To the Holy Angels)
in
Hannover
was designed by
Josef Bieling
to symbolize the
tent of God among men.
Nun bitten wir den Heiligen Geist
Nun danket all und bringet Ehr
Soprano
Rachel Yakar,
who received international attention in 1977
as
Poppea with
Nikolaus Harnoncourt,
was also described as an "ideal"
Mélisande
and "a Mozartian at heart and in style".
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Andris Nelsons
(born 18 November 1978)
conducted
Bartok's
Viola Concerto
and Mahler's
Fifth Symphony
in the final concert with his
Nordwestdeutsche Philharmonie.
In 2008
Naji Hakim composed
variations for
oboe and
organ
on Philipp Nicolai's
chorale
"
Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern",
published in 1599.
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Claude Kahn
(9 November 1935 – 17 November 2023),
who won the
Franz Liszt Competition at age 15,
founded and directed
a piano competition in his name in 1970,
and the conservatoire of
Antibes in 1971.
|
Two
conductors
shared performances
of Verdi's
Messa da Requiem
in
St. Martin, Idstein.
Palmeri:
Misatango
Reulein:
Te Deum
look and listen to us
Benjamin Britten
(22 November 1913 – 4 December 1976),
composed
Canticle I: My beloved is mine and I am his
for the tenor voice of
Peter Pears,
using poetry from
A Divine Rapture by
Francis Quarles.
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Thanksgiving
Lea Ackermann,
a German nun of the
Missionary Sisters of Our Lady of Africa,
fought against
forced prostitution and
sex tourism
in East Africa.
Colette Maze,
the last pianist who studied with
Alfred Cortot,
recorded music by
Claude Debussy,
who was still alive when she was born in 1914,
in 2023.
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Burgenland Croat sculptor
Thomas Resetarits
(25 November 1939 – 18 May 2022)
created
Stations of the Cross.
Director
Frank Stähle revived
the choir and orchestra of
Dr. Hoch's Konservatorium
and conducted them in
Mozart's Requiem
for the centenary of the
Lutherkirche in Wiesbaden.
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Jerome Kohl
(November 27, 1946 – August 4, 2020),
a music theorist of the
University of Washington,
was recognized internationally
as an authority on the composer
Karlheinz Stockhausen,
publishing a book on his
Zeitmaße in 2017.
François Glorieux
was a Belgian pianist and improvisor,
conductor of the
BBC Radio Orchestra and
Stan Kenton's band,
and arranger for
Michael Jackson.
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Contralto
Sonia Prina
(born 30 November 1975)
performed the title role
of Antonio Vivaldi's 1727 opera
Orlando furioso
at the
Oper Frankfurt,
staged as a
rocker.
American lyric tenor
Douglas Ahlstedt,
who appeared as a child as Miles
in the U.S. premiere of Britten's
The Turn of the Screw,
performed at the
Met 191 times,
before and after he was a member
of the
Deutsche Oper am Rhein.
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Bernard Ładysz,
a
bass-baritone who performed in world premieres
of
Krzysztof Penderecki's music
in Hamburg and
in Salzburg,
was the only Polish singer to appear with
Maria Callas
(2 December 1923 – 16 September 1977).
Andréa Guiot appeared internationally
in French
soprano roles
such as
Mireille,
Marguerite,
Manon,
and Micaëla in Bizet's
Carmen,
which she recorded alongside
Maria Callas
in the title role.
The
Advent song
"
Macht hoch die Tür"
(Fling wide the door),
with text by
Georg Weissel written for the inauguration of
the church
where he would be ordained pastor a week later,
is number 1 in the
German Protestant hymnal.
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Conductor Dessauer and composer Mawby (r.), 2012 |
Gabriel Dessauer
(born 4 December 1955)
conducted the premiere of Reger's
Hebbel Requiem
in the organ version of
Max Beckschäfer
with
a project choir at the
Marktkirche in Wiesbaden.
The prolific composer and
Westminster Cathedral conductor
Colin Mawby
said, "I cannot write choral music unless I work with choirs ...
I have to write for particular people".
Christof Loy
(born 5 December 1962)
received the 2008
Der Faust award as best opera director
for staging Mozart's
Così fan tutte at the
Oper Frankfurt.
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Wilhelm II,
German Emperor,
called the
Kurhaus in Wiesbaden
"the most beautiful spa in the world"
at the opening ceremony.
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Ignace Michiels
(born 7 December 1963)
of the
St. Salvator's Cathedral in Bruges
has been the
organist
for the German-Flemish
Reger-Chor
in works such as Reger's
Requiem.
Reger: Der 100. Psalm
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Max Reger
composed "in new simplicity"
Unser lieben Frauen Traum,
a
motet suitable for
Advent,
about a dream of
Mary
of a tree growing in her.
Medea Amiranashvili,
a Georgian operatic
soprano and academic teacher,
portrayed characters such as
Revaz Lagidze's Lela,
Verdi's Leonora in
Il trovatore and Puccini's
Madama Butterfly,
with "fierce inner expression".
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In 1973
Luten Petrowsky
(10 December 1933 – 10 July 2023)
played the saxophone in a quartet
that made the first record
with jazz musicians
from both East and West Germany.
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The lawyer
Wolfgang Wieland,
a co-founder of the Berlin
Greens
and their speaker in the city parliament,
represented the joint plaintiff
in the
Mykonos restaurant assassinations.
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The
Advent hymn
"
O Heiland, reiß die Himmel auf"
(O Saviour, tear open the heavens)
was written against a backdrop
of the
Thirty Years' War, the
plague,
and
witch trials.
Rabbi
Michael Robinson
(December 13, 1924 – July 20, 2006)
and 15 other
Reform rabbis
were arrested and jailed after answering Martin Luther King's
call to stand with him for civil rights in St. Augustine, Florida.
Wolfgang Rennert
conducted the world premieres
of Louise Talma's
Die Alkestiade at the
Oper Frankfurt
and
Rainer Kunad's Sabellicus at the
Staatsoper Berlin.
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Erna Berger sang the title role
of Smetana's
The Bartered Bride
in a 1955 recording with
Wilhelm Schüchter
(15 December 1911 – 27 May 1974)
and the
Nordwestdeutsche Philharmonie.
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Prince Nikolaus Esterházy,
who commissioned
Beethoven's
Mass in C major
for his wife's
name day,
found it "unbearably ridiculous and detestable".
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In 2018
Lydia Steier,
born in
Hartford, Connecticut,
became the first woman
to stage Mozart's
Die Zauberflöte
at the
Salzburg Festival.
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Martin Luther's hymn
"
Mit Fried und Freud ich fahr dahin",
a reflection of the
canticle of Simeon,
is the base of funeral music
by Schütz, Buxtehude and Bach.
"
Mit Ernst, o Menschenkinder",
a 1642
Advent hymn,
includes a call to penitence
that
John the Baptist took
from the prophet
Isaiah.
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The German
Advent song
"
Tochter Zion, freue dich"
has words by
Friedrich Heinrich Ranke
set to music used
for triumphant entrances
in two of
Handel's
oratorios.
Soprano
Nadine Secunde
(born 21 December 1953)
was praised for "formidable acting skills"
in the title role of Dmitri Shostakovich's
Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk.
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Der neue
Catalogue of Works of Carl Friedrich Abel
wurde 2023 in Köthen vorgestellt,
wo der Gambist
vor 300 Jahren geboren wurde.
The new
Catalogue of Works of Carl Friedrich Abel
(AbelWV)
was introduced in
Köthen,
where the
viol virtuoso was born
on 22 December 1723.
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Gunther Emmerlich,
bass singer and television presenter,
appeared as Kuno
in the performance of Weber's
Der Freischütz
to open the restored
Semperoper.
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On Christmas Eve in 1818,
the Christmas carol
"Stille Nacht"
("
Silent Night")
was first performed in the
Nikolauskirche
in
Oberndorf, Austria.
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"
Verbum caro factum est",
a Christmas
motet for six voices
by
Hans Leo Hassler
in the
Venetian polychoral style,
has been arranged
for
brass ensembles.
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Bach's cantata for the second day of Christmas,
Darzu ist erschienen der Sohn Gottes
("For this the Son of God appeared"),
BWV 40,
is his first
Christmas cantata
composed for Leipzig.
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Bach has
a choir of
trombones double
the choir in
his cantata
Sehet, welch eine Liebe hat uns der Vater erzeiget, BWV 64,
for the
Third Day of Christmas,
dedicated to
John the Evangelist
and first performed on 27 December 1723.
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Diethard Hellmann
(28 December 1928 – 14 October 1999),
the director of church music at the
Christuskirche in Mainz,
reconstructed the music
of the lost
Bach cantata for the Third Sunday in
Advent,
Ärgre dich, o Seele, nicht, BWV 186a.
|
Rebekka Habermas,
a German historian
at the
University of Göttingen,
who also taught
in Paris, Montreal and New York,
focused on people
in the social and cultural conditions
of 19th-century Germany.
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Heike Matthiesen
recorded a 2016 album
Guitar Ladies
of compositions for guitar solo by women
including Sidney Pratten (1821–1895),
María Luisa Anido,
Ida Presti,
Sofia Gubaidulina,
Sylvie Bodorová,
Annette Kruisbrink, and
Maria Linnemann
who had dedicated her work to the player.
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A German theologian wrote
"
Vertraut den neuen Wegen"
(Trust the new ways)
to the melody of
Lob Gott getrost mit Singen
(Praise God confidently with singing)
to be sung at a wedding in
Eisenach
shortly before the
fall of the Wall.
This is the 2023 archive of my daily stories, with an overview at User:Gerda Arendt/Story list. -- Gerda Arendt ( talk) 10:33, 1 January 2024 (UTC)
... and a selection here -- Gerda Arendt ( talk) 22:02, 7 February 2024 (UTC)
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Concentricities,
a 2019
clarinet–cello–piano trio by
Graham Waterhouse,
musically depicts a theme
of circular, spiraling, or oscillating concentric phenomena
in nature and human structures
Compositions by Graham Waterhouse
range from the beginning
of his
String Sextet, Op. 1, in 1979
to the Fantasia Ucraina for two violins in 2022.
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Stanislavski and Nemirovich-Danchenko Theatre |
Volodymyr Kozhukhar,
the chief conductor
of the
National Opera of Ukraine in Kyiv,
led Lysenko's opera
Taras Bulba
and Shchedrin's ballet
Carmen Suite.
Galina Pisarenko,
a
soprano of Moscow's
Stanislavski and Nemirovich-Danchenko Theatre
for almost 30 years,
taught at the
Moscow Conservatory
until her death at age 88.
| |
d. 13 January 2012 |
Guido Dessauer,
a German executive and art collector,
registered more than 30 patents
in paper technology
and started the career of
Horst Janssen
as a
lithographer
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In
Mother and Child,
composed in 2002 by
John Tavener
for the vocal ensemble
Tenebrae,
organ and temple
gong
enter for the climax.
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Elisabeth Waterhouse founded
the National Chamber Music Course summer school in 1974
and has managed it since.
Graham Waterhouse began
his
String Sextet op. 1 in 1979,
and completed it 34 years later.
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The
Messe in A by
Christopher Tambling,
originally set for high voices,
proved so popular that a four-part version was commissioned.
Johannes Schröder composed an
oratorio
honouring
Katharina Kaspar,
who became a new
saint in 2018.
Mezzo-soprano
Elena Manistina
stepped in on short notice for the premiere
of Tchaikovsky's
The Enchantress at
Oper Frankfurt.
Clytus Gottwald arranged compositions
for an
a cappella group of up to 16 voices,
re-creating them "in a magical choral world".
19 July 2012
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Clytus Gottwald arranged compositions
for an
a cappella group of up to 16 voices,
re-creating them "in a magical choral world".
The
Romanesque church
St. Peter
in Syburg, now a suburb of
Dortmund,
is surrounded by a graveyard
with stones dating back to the ninth century.
Clytus Gottwald arranged compositions
for an
a cappella group of up to 16 voices,
re-creating them "in a magical choral world".
Gertrude Pitzinger,
who toured Europe and the United States singing
Lieder,
recorded the alto part of Mozart's
Requiem,
conducted by
Ferenc Fricsay.
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In 1866 a
Neogothic style school building
was erected for the
Kreuzschule in
Dresden,
which has educated members of
the choir of the
Kreuzkirche since 1300.
Clytus Gottwald arranged compositions
for an
a cappella group of up to 16 voices,
re-creating them "in a magical choral world".
In
Bach's chorale cantata
Ich hab in Gottes Herz und Sinn, BWV 92,
for
Septuagesima, he created
five different settings for
five stanzas of the hymn by
Paul Gerhardt.
Mezzo-soprano
Elena Manistina
stepped in on short notice for the premiere
of Tchaikovsky's
The Enchantress at
Oper Frankfurt.
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Nikolaus Herman based
the melody of his
Christmas carol
"
Lobt Gott, ihr Christen alle gleich"
on the
Gregorian hymn
"
Puer natus est nobis".
Mezzo-soprano
Elena Manistina
stepped in on short notice for the premiere
of Tchaikovsky's
The Enchantress
at
Oper Frankfurt.
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Soprano
Melitta Muszely
appeared as the four women
Hoffmann loves
in
Felsenstein's production
at the
Komische Oper Berlin in 1958,
and still sang recitals at age 80.
Bach's
solo cantata
Ich habe genug, BWV 82,
based on the
Canticle of Simeon,
has been recorded more than 100 times.
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Soprano
Melitta Muszely
appeared as the four women
Hoffmann loves
in
Felsenstein's production
at the
Komische Oper Berlin in 1958,
and still sang recitals at age 80.
Composer and music director
August Röckel,
who was active in the
May Uprising in Dresden
along with his friend
Richard Wagner,
was arrested and was the last prisoner released.
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born 4 February 1944 |
Michael Herrmann (pictured)
is founder-director of the
Rheingau Musik Festival,
which holds about 150 concerts every season
in vineyards and historical buildings.
Soprano
Melitta Muszely
appeared as the four women
Hoffmann loves
in
Felsenstein's production
at the
Komische Oper Berlin in 1958,
and still sang recitals at age 80.
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Hans Krieger,
an
award-winning German
essayist,
influential in papers such as
Die Zeit,
wrote the text for a Christmas cantata
by
Graham Waterhouse that premieres today.
Soprano
Melitta Muszely
appeared as the four women
Hoffmann loves
in
Felsenstein's production
at the
Komische Oper Berlin in 1958,
and still sang recitals at age 80.
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Nicolas Joel,
general manager of the
Paris Opera from 2009 to 2014,
directed Wagner's
Ring in 1979
after having assisted
Patrice Chéreau for
the cycle's centenary.
Soprano
Melitta Muszely
appeared as the four women
Hoffmann loves
in
Felsenstein's production
at the
Komische Oper Berlin in 1958,
and still sang recitals at age 80.
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Jesus nahm zu sich die Zwölfe ('Jesus gathered the Twelve to Himself', is a church cantata by Johann Sebastian Bach, written for the last Sunday before Lent. He composed it as an audition piece for the position of director of church music in Leipzig, and he first performed it there in a church service at the Thomaskirche on 7 February 1723. The work begins with a scene from the Gospel in which Jesus predicts his suffering in Jerusalem, and is not understood by his disciples. Bach showed, setting the prescribed text of an unknown poet, that he mastered the composition of a dramatic scene, an expressive aria with obbligato oboe, a recitative with strings, an exuberant dance, and a chorale in the style of Johann Kuhnau, his predecessor in Leipzig. According to the Bach scholar Richard D. P. Jones, several elements of the work such as a "frame of biblical text and chorale around the operatic forms of aria and recitative" became standards for Bach's Leipzig cantatas and even his Passions. ( Full article...)
After
Domen Križaj from Slovenia
was a prize winner in the singing competition
Neue Stimmen,
he moved to the
Oper Frankfurt where he appeared
as Massenet's
Albert and Mozart's
Papageno.
In
Patrick Süskind's play
Der Kontrabaß,
the double bass in the title role
is a "constant handicap" to its player,
"humanly, socially, sexually, musically".
Ukrainian actress
Oksana Shvets,
who was killed in the
2022 invasion of Ukraine,
starred in the 2013 joint Ukrainian–Russian television family saga
House with Lilies alongside Russian actors.
Dennis Russell Davies conducted
the premiere of the Fifth Symphony
Now and in the hour of death
by
Heinz Winbeck,
which reflects Bruckner's
Ninth Symphony
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Arvo Pärt began his choral composition
Da pacem Domine
(Give peace, Lord)
two days after the
2004 Madrid train bombings.
Max Reger composed
20
Responsories in English
for use in the American Lutheran church,
although he did not speak English.
Helene Wildbrunn,
a celebrated
Wagnerian soprano
at the
Vienna State Opera and
La Scala,
began her career in 1907 as a
contralto
at the
Stadttheater Dortmund.
Richard Wagner
(22 May 1813 - 13 February 1883)
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Alte Liebe (Old Love)
is a novel about a couple married for 40 years,
told by a couple married longer but separated,
with chapters written alternately
by
wife and
husband.
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After
George Alexander Albrecht
collapsed when conducting
Beethoven's Ninth Symphony
during a New Year's concert,
he returned to composing and began
hospice work.
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Hans-Dieter Bader
(16 February 1938 - 18 June 2022)
performed the title role
of Ermanno Wolf-Ferrari's opera
Sly,
recorded live at the
Staatsoper Hannover,
"as written", while
Plácido Domingo
had to cut and change the part.
|
Concert venues of the
Rheingau Musik Festival
include
Eberbach Abbey,
Schloss Johannisberg
and
Lorch.
28 June 2023
Bach:
Mass in B minor
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Robert Hammerstiel
(18 February 1933 - 23 November 2020)
wrapped Vienna's
Ringturm tower
in a painting showing stations of human life
in simplified and brightly coloured figures.
"
Geh aus, mein Herz, und suche Freud",
written by
Paul Gerhardt
after the
Thirty Years War,
was translated as
"Go Forth, My Heart, and Seek Delight".
The journalist
Johann Georg Reißmüller
(20 February 1932 – 10 December 2018),
a co-publisher of
Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung,
is credited with playing an important part
in Germany's recognition of
Croatia and
Slovenia.
Dutch baritone
John Bröcheler (born 1945)
first sang concerts including world premieres,
but was "discovered" for opera in a role
of Donizetti's
Maria Stuarda alongside
Joan Sutherland.
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Olivier Latry
(born 22 February 1962),
organist at
Notre-Dame de Paris,
played a concert at
St. Martin in
Lorch am Rhein in 2019.
For his ordination,
Georg Weissel wrote the text of the hymn
"
Such, wer da will, ein ander Ziel"
to
his friend's melody for a wedding song.
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Nele Hertling
(born 23 February 1934),
working for the
Academy of Arts, Berlin,
brought innovative culture to the city
including the
Tanz im August festival.
Tanz im August,
an annual international festival of
contemporary dance in Berlin,
was founded by
Nele Hertling in 1988.
The choral music of
Artemy Vedel,
who is regarded as one of the Golden Three composers of 18th-century
Ukrainian classical music,
was censored but performed from handwritten copies.
The 1885 spiritual anthem
Prayer for Ukraine
was performed by
Ukrainian Chorus Dumka of New York on
Saturday Night Live.
The 1641 edition
Selva morale e spirituale by
Claudio Monteverdi
is considered his
"most significant anthology of liturgical works
since the
Vespers in 1610".
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The art of
Ruth-Margret Pütz
(26 February 1930 – 1 April 2019)
a leading
coloratura soprano of the 1960s,
was published in a 2018 Recital,
including excerpts as
Konstanze and
Zerbinetta.
The 1885 spiritual anthem
Prayer for Ukraine
was performed by
Ukrainian Chorus Dumka of New York
on
Saturday Night Live.
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Max Reger's
Piano Concerto
was premiered by
Frieda Hodapp in 1910,
but has rarely been performed since, due to its difficulty.
The choral music of
Artemy Vedel,
who is regarded as one of the Golden Three composers
of 18th-century
Ukrainian classical music,
was censored but performed from handwritten copies.
Doris Stockhausen's
husband
dedicated several compositions to her,
beginning with
Chöre für Doris in 1950 before they married.
born 1924 · 28 February 2021
Elisabeth Waterhouse
founded the National Chamber Music Course summer school in 1974
and has managed it since.
born 1933 · 21 January 2023
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In 2005
composer
Krzysztof Penderecki
added a
Ciaccona for strings
to his
Polish Requiem,
begun in 1980.
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In 1524,
Elisabeth Cruciger's hymn
"
Herr Christ, der einig Gotts Sohn"
was the only song by a female author
published in the Lutheran hymnal
Erfurt Enchiridion.
The title page of the
Erfurt Enchiridion,
a
Lutheran
hymnal from 1524 with 26 songs,
recommends using the handbook
"for continuous practice and contemplation".
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The
Opernhaus Dortmund
was opened in 1966 with
Der Rosenkavalier,
performed in
Dortmund first in 1911.
Liselotte Hammes,
a soprano with the
Cologne Opera,
appeared as Sophie in
Der Rosenkavalier
at the
Glyndebourne Festival
alongside
Teresa Żylis-Gara in the title role
and
Montserrat Caballé as the Marschallin.
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The poet, cartoonist, and satirist
F. W. Bernstein
(4 March 1938 – 20 December 2018)
was appointed
professor of caricature and comics
in Berlin in 1984,
the only such chair in the world at the time.
The contralto
Elisabeth Schärtel,
known for performing many Wagner roles at the
Bayreuth Festival,
sang Verdi's
Meg Page alongside
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau as Falstaff.
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Siegfried Vogel
(born 6 March 1937),
a bass at the
Berlin State Opera from 1965,
appeared at the
Metropolitan Opera in New York
and at the
Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow
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Willigis Jäger
(7 March 1924 – 20 March 2020),
a German
Benedictine friar,
studied
Zen for six years with
Yamada Koun in Japan
and introduced it to his order.
Hans-Karl von Kupsch
(7 March 1937 – 26 April 2020),
who was instrumental in the unification
of the
East and West German booksellers' associations,
ran a gallery of contemporary art together with his wife.
Hana Blažíková
is a soprano
with the
Bach Collegium Japan,
conducted by
Masaaki Suzuki,
for the project to record the complete
Bach cantatas
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Azio Corghi
(9 March 1937 – 17 November 2022)
composed his second and third operas with author
José Saramago,
– the second for
La Scala in Milan,
and
the third for a 1993 premiere at the
Theater Münster
When the
Theater Münster opened in 1956,
it was regarded as the first new theatre in Germany
after World War II.
Delores Ziegler,
who teaches voice at the
University of Maryland,
appeared as Dorabella in Mozart's
Così fan tutte
for her debut at
La Scala, and in the film by
Ponnelle and
Harnoncourt.
John Rutter set
Psalm 23 in
The Lord is my Shepherd
for choir and organ,
and later included it in his
Requiem.
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Odile Pierre
(12 March 1932 – 29 February 2020),
who became interested in the organ
at a recital by
Marcel Dupré at the age of seven,
later served as the organist of
La Madeleine in Paris
and played around 2,000 recitals herself.
Hans Krieger
(13 March 1933 – 9 January 2023),
an
award-winning German
essayist,
influential in papers such as
Die Zeit,
wrote the text for a Christmas cantata
by
Graham Waterhouse that premieres today.
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Kyrie from Petite messe solennelle, premiered 14 March 1864 |
Rossini scored the last of his "sins of old age",
the
Petite messe solennelle
,
for twelve singers, two pianos, and
harmonium.
The German musicologist
Ludwig Finscher (14 March 1930 – 30 June 2020)
was the editor of
Die Musik in Geschichte und Gegenwart,
an encyclopedia in 28 volumes, placing
music in cultural, social, and historical context.
Lorenzo Viotti
(born 15 March 1990)
conducted Massenet's
Werther
in three productions in opera houses of three countries in 2017,
silently singing with the soloists.
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Volodymyr Kozhukhar
(16 March 1941 – 3 December 2022),
the chief conductor of
the
National Opera of Ukraine in Kyiv,
led Lysenko's opera
Taras Bulba
and Shchedrin's ballet
Carmen Suite.
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Arvo Pärt composed the
motet
The Deer's Cry
on a commission from
Louth, Ireland,
setting the conclusion of
Saint Patrick's Breastplate,
"Christ with me".
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Christa Wolf
(18 March 1929 – 1 December 2011)
wrote
Der geteilte Himmel
in a "quest for personal integrity within a flawed system",
published in East Germany in 1963
and called a "socialist bestseller".
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The
Requiem
of
Max Reger
(19 March 1873 – 11 May 1916)
is a musical setting not of the Latin
Requiem,
but of a poem "Requiem"
written by the
dramatist
Friedrich Hebbel
When
Stefan Keil
(20 March 1958 – 16 December 2021)
moved to
Yekaterinburg, Russia, as the German consul general,
one of his first appearances was
at the European Christmas market, dressed as
Saint Nicholas.
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Johann Sebastian Bach
([O.S.] 21 March 1685 – 28 July 1750)
wrote around 200
cantatas in German but only one,
Gloria in excelsis Deo, BWV 191,
in
Latin.
Conductor
Helmuth Rilling,
Gächinger Kantorei and
Bach-Collegium Stuttgart
finished the first complete recording
of Bach's
cantatas and
oratorios
on the composer's 300th birthday, 21 March 1985.
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The soprano
Margit Bokor
created the role of Zdenka in
Arabella by Richard Strauss
at the
Semperoper in Dresden in 1933,
and performed the role
in the UK premiere at the
Royal Opera House.
Maria Friesenhausen
(23 March 1932 – 31 July 2020)
sang soprano solo with the
NDR Chor in the 1950s
and trained students of the
University of Dortmund
for an opera performance in 2001.
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Soprano
Annette Dasch
(born 24 March 1976)
appeared as Elettra in Mozart's
Idomeneo
at the reopening of the
Cuvilliés Theatre,
where that opera had been premiered in 1781.
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Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern, BWV 1
,
Bach's chorale cantata
for the feast of the
Annunciation,
was first performed on
Palm Sunday.
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Architect
Jörg Streli
(26 March 1940 – 13 February 2019)
and his two colleagues designed
the Sankt-Margarethen-Kapelle in
Tyrol,
which rises like a tower on a circular floor.
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The
Klassische Philharmonie Bonn,
a symphony orchestra founded and conducted
by
Heribert Beissel
(27 March 1933 – 11 June 2021),
has a tradition of playing a series of concerts
at more than ten major halls in Germany.
Tilge, Höchster, meine Sünden,
BWV 1083,
is a sacred vocal composition by
Johann Sebastian Bach,
a 1740s arrangement of Pergolesi's
Stabat Mater from 1736,
with a text from
Psalm 51.
The soprano
Leonore Kirschstein
(29 March 1933 – 26 February 2017)
appeared as Alice Ford,
with
Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau as
Falstaff.
|
Composer
Jan Müller-Wieland
(born 30 April 1966)
called his first stage work,
premiered at the
Munich Biennale in 1992,
a "
Cabaret
Farce for singers,
pianists and
percussionists".
|
The
Munich Biennale
is an
opera festival created in 1988 by
Hans Werner Henze,
focused on opera premieres of young composers.
Composer
Jan Müller-Wieland
(born 30 April 1966)
called his first stage work,
premiered at the
Munich Biennale in 1992,
a "Cabaret Farce for singers, pianists and percussionists".
The soprano
Rotraud Hansmann
(born 1 April 1940)
performed six roles in three Monteverdi operas
conducted by
Nikolaus Harnoncourt,
including Euridice in
L'Orfeo.
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The
Alchymic Quartet
is a
string quartet by
Graham Waterhouse,
to be performed alongside chemical experiments
of
Andrew Szydlo,
his former teacher at
Highgate School.
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Renate Behle
(born 3 April 1945)
made her operatic debut in 1968
and appeared as Sara in the premiere of
Giorgio Battistelli's Lot
at the
Staatsoper Hannover in 2017.
|
Hans-Karl von Kupsch,
who was instrumental in the unification
of the
East and West German booksellers' associations,
ran a gallery of contemporary art together with his wife.
Karlheinz Oswald created sculptures
of
Cardinal Volk,
Pierre de Coubertin and
Hildegard of Bingen.
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Marjon Lambriks
(born 5 April 1949),
who studied voice in the Netherlands
with
Paula Lindberg (both pictured)
and made a career in Vienna,
recorded
La traviata alongside
Pavarotti.
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In a motet for
Maundy Thursday,
Tristis est anima mea,
Jesus says in
Gethsemane
"
Sad is my soul even unto death".
Gottfried August Homilius wrote
Passions for Good Friday services
during his time as music director of
the
Church of the Holy Cross in Dresden.
Bach's
St Matthew Passion is structured
in 67 movements, according to the
NBA,
and tells the
Passion based on
the
Gospel of Matthew,
Picander's contemporary poetry, and chorales.
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A chorale fantasia on
"
O Mensch, bewein dein Sünde groß"
(O man, bewail thy sins so great)
by
Sebald Heyden
concludes Part I of
Bach's
St Matthew Passion.
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A 2009 recording of
Louis Vierne's
Messe solennelle
for choir and two organs at
Saint-Sulpice,
where it was first performed in 1901,
was called "musical and spiritual time-travel".
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The opening chorus of
Bach's
cantata for the
Second Day of Easter,
Erfreut euch, ihr Herzen, BWV 66
,
has been termed
"one of the longest and most exhilarating of Bach's early works".
Heinz Hennig
founded the
Knabenchor Hannover in 1950
and conducted the
boys' choir until 2001.
Günther Leib
(born 12 April 1927),
who often sang at the
Halle Handel Festival,
was called a "first rate
Beckmesser" by
The New York Times
when he first appeared at the
Metropolitan Opera.
"Handel's
Messiah
(premiered in Dublin on 13 April 1742)
is among the most frequently performed
and best-loved works in all choral music."
(
Brian Boulton,
2011)
Eleonore Schönborn
(14 April 1920 – 25 February 2022),
who had to
leave Czechoslovakia in 1945 with two young children,
received
an Austrian award in 2013
for cultural and social improvement.
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The melody of the Christian hymn
"
Ik sta voor U in leegte en gemis"
(I stand before You in emptiness and loss)
is sometimes printed without
bar lines,
reflecting the singer's insecurity and questions.
text by
Huub Oosterhuis
(1 November 1933 – 9 April 2023)
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Erich Korngold's opera
Die tote Stadt
had simultaneous premieres
in Cologne and Hamburg in 1920, one with
Johanna Geisler
as Marietta
and her husband
Otto Klemperer conducting.
Ik sta voor U in leegte en gemis
in memory of
Huub Oosterhuis
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The
Lichtental Church,
consecrated in 1730 to the
Fourteen Holy Helpers,
is known as the Schubertkirche,
because
Schubert was baptised
and conducted his
sacred music there.
Herr, unser Herr, wie bist du zugegen
in memory of
Huub Oosterhuis
A song of God's presence,
written in 1965 in Dutch by
Huub Oosterhuis,
became part of
the first common German Catholic hymnal,
and was retained in
the second by popular demand.
"
Herr, unser Herr, wie bist du zugegen"
is a German hymn translating a Dutch · "Lied van Gods aanwezigheid"
(song of God's presence)" written in 1965 by
Huub Oosterhuis.
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Composer
Graham Waterhouse was the
cellist
in a performance of his
string trio
Zeichenstaub
at his
former school,
playing the U.K. premiere
with two members of the
Münchner Philharmoniker.
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John Eliot Gardiner
(born 20 April 1943)
performed
Bach's cantatas for
Reformation Day
in the
Schloßkirche, Wittenberg,
as part of the
Bach Cantata Pilgrimage,
including
Gott der Herr ist Sonn und Schild, BWV 79.
The
art photographers
Anna and Bernhard Blume
created Kitchen Frenzy and Pure Reason.
(A.B. 21 April 1936 – 18 June 2020)
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For a rare performance of the
St Matthew Passion
by 18th-century composer
Homilius in 2023,
conductor
Clemens Bosselmann
had to track down handwritten sheet music.
Hans Uwe Hielscher played
the 1500th weekly organ recital during market time
at the
Marktkirche in Wiesbaden
in a series he initiated some 30 years earlier.
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Erhard Egidi
(23 April 1929 – 8 September 2014)
conducted at the
Neustädter Kirche both
the first performance after more than 300 years
of a funeral music by the church's first organist
and Bach's
Mass in B minor.
Tenor
Martin Petzold
(25 June 1955 – 19 April 2023)
a former member of the boys' choir
Thomanerchor,
was a singer of
Bach's Evangelist parts with the group.
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Matti Lehtinen
(24 April 1922 – 16 August 2022),
a
baritone of the
Finnish National Opera
and professor of singing at the
Sibelius Academy,
was the voice of God at age 93.
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The concert choir
Schiersteiner Kantorei,
founded 50 years ago in
Wiesbaden-
Schierstein,
performed Bach's
St Matthew Passion in the
Marktkirche.
Tenor
Martin Petzold
(25 June 1955 – 19 April 2023)
a former member of the boys' choir
Thomanerchor,
sang
Bach's Evangelist parts with the group.
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Contralto
Marga Höffgen
(26 April 1921 – 7 July 1995),
known as a Bach singer for
Karajan
and as
Erda in
Bayreuth,
recorded Max Reger's
Requiem compositions.
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Adalbert Kraus
(born 27 April 1937)
performed the tenor part
in Bach's
Easter Oratorio,
Kommt, eilet und laufet (Come, hasten and run).
Poèmes pour Mi
is a song cycle by
Olivier Messiaen
(10 December 1908 – 27 April 1992),
who set his own poems
for a
grand soprano dramatique and orchestra,
and dedicated it to
his wife.
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Giuseppe Verdi
combined in
Quattro pezzi sacri
four sacred vocal compositions,
including an
Ave Maria
on an
enigmatic scale for solo voices
and a
Te Deum.
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Hana Blažíková is a soprano
with the
Bach Collegium Japan, conducted by
Masaaki Suzuki
(born 29 April 1954),
for the project to record the complete
Bach cantatas.
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Bach was only in his twenties
when he composed the
cantata
Christ lag in Todes Banden, BWV 4,
for
Easter,
using in seven movements
the words and tune
of
Martin Luther's
Easter chorale.
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Francis Poulenc composed
Litanies à la Vierge Noire,
a French litany to the Black Virgin
at
Rocamadour,
after a pilgrimage to the shrine.
During the last decade,
Lance Ryan
(born 1 May 1971)
appeared as
Siegfried
at three
Bayreuth Festivals.
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Manfred Weiss,
who taught composition
at the
Musikhochschule Dresden
from 1959 to 1997,
composed a cantata after the
Book of Revelation
premiered by the
Dresdner Kreuzchor
conducted by
Roderich Kreile.
Hans Stadlmair
(3 May 1929 – 13 February 2019),
conductor of the
Münchener Kammerorchester for almost four decades,
in 1971 premiered
Wilhelm Killmayer's Fin al punto,
of which the composer said,
"The calm already contains the catastrophe".
The tenor
Kurt Huber
(born 4 May 1937)
sang the
Evangelist in
Bach's Ascension Oratorio
Lobet Gott in seinen Reichen, BWV 11,
composed for the feast of the
Ascension of 275 years ago.
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The 1965 song
"
Wie als een God wil leven",
written by
Huub Oosterhuis, was listed in 2013
as a hymn in German successful with young people.
The rhythm of
"
Solang es Menschen gibt auf Erden",
to a Dutch hymn translated into German,
has been compared to a
tango.
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Max Reger dedicated
Der Einsiedler
to conductor
Philipp Wolfrum and his choir,
but they performed the premiere only after the composer's death,
together with his
Requiem.
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The prolific composer
and
Westminster Cathedral conductor
Colin Mawby
(9 May 1936 – 24 November 2019)
said,
"I cannot write choral music
unless I work with choirs
... I have to write for particular people".
He wrote the Bonifatiusmess for the 150th anniversary of Chor von St. Bonifatius in Wiesbaden in 2012, then conducted by Gabriel Dessauer.
In one concert,
bassoonist
Lyndon Watts
premiered
Bernd Redmann's Migrant,
and played
Jörg Duda's first Finnish Quartet,
which he had commissioned,
and the
Bassoon Quintet of
Graham Waterhouse,
which he had premiered.
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The
late-Gothic church
St. Lamberti in
Hildesheim
was rebuilt after destruction in World War II,
but a southern annex was kept in ruins
as a memorial.
Raimund Hoghe
(12 May 1949 – 14 May 2021),
who was awarded the
German Dance Prize in 2020,
made a self-portrait documentary film Der Buckel (The Hunchback).
Kari Løvaas
(born 13 May 1939)
appeared in the premiere of Orff's
De temporum fine comoedia
at the
Salzburg Festival.
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Bach began his
cantata,
Wahrlich, wahrlich, ich sage euch, BWV 86,
(first performed on 14 May 1724),
with a quotation from the
Farewell discourse,
sung by the
bass as the
vox Christi.
The Polish
soprano
Zofia Kilanowicz
(born 15 May 1963)
appeared as Roxana in Szymanowski's
King Roger in Paris,
and recorded Górecki's
Symphony of Sorrowful Songs.
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Faustas Latėnas
(16 May 1956 – 3 November 2020),
vice-minister of Lithuania's
Ministry of Culture,
composed
incidental music, film scores,
and a
string quartet subtitled "In loving memory".
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Günter Wewel
(29 November 1934 – 9 May 2023),
for around 30 years
operatic bass
at the
Opernhaus Dortmund,
presented the television series
Kein schöner Land,
portraying regions in Europe filmed at the locations.
Bass-baritone
Stephen Varcoe
(born 19 May 1949)
recorded
Bach cantatas with the
Monteverdi Choir,
including
Wachet auf, ruft uns die Stimme, BWV 140.
Poetess
Christiana Mariana von Ziegler
ended her text for
Bach's cantata
Also hat Gott die Welt geliebt, BWV 68,
for
Pentecost Monday
with a quotation from the Gospel?
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The art of
Irma Blank,
of "drawing languages without words"
and including sounds,
was recognised in the 1970s
but fell into obscurity until a rediscovery in the 2010s.
Maria Mies
(6 February 1931 – 15 May 2023)
from a small village in the
Vulkaneifel
studied the position of women first in India
and cofounded
the first
women's shelter in Germany.
Johann Sebastian Bach reworked music
from more than three decades earlier
for the central piece Crucifixus
in the symmetrical structure of his
Mass in B minor.
Franz Schubert dedicated compositions to
Cathinka Buchwieser
(24 May 1789 – 9 July 1828),
a soprano who appeared in Vienna
as Mozart's
Sesto and
Elvira,
and as
Ferdinando Paer's Achille and
Leonora.
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Jubilate and
Te Deum
from the
Morning, Evening and Communion Service in B-flat
by
Charles Villiers Stanford
were first performed
in Cambridge
on 25 May 1879.
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The text for
Bach's last
cantata
in his second year in
Leipzig,
Es ist ein trotzig und verzagt Ding, BWV 176,
reflects the meeting of Jesus and
Nicodemus.
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The Easter composition
Surrexit a mortuis
(He rose from the dead)
was scored for choir and two organs
by
Charles-Marie Widor,
the organist at
Saint-Sulpice in Paris?
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Johann Sebastian Bach
marked to repeat the opening chorus
of the
cantata for
Pentecost,
Erschallet, ihr Lieder, erklinget, ihr Saiten!
BWV 172,
after the final chorale.
Poetess
Christiana Mariana von Ziegler
ended her text for
Bach's cantata
Also hat Gott die Welt geliebt, BWV 68,
for
Pentecost Monday
with a quotation from the Gospel.
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On 30 May 1723,
Johann Sebastian Bach
assumed the office of
Thomaskantor in Leipzig,
presenting his first new cantata,
Die Elenden sollen essen, BWV 75,
in the
St. Nicholas Church
on the first Sunday after
Trinity.
Mezzo-soprano
Eva Randová
was nominated for the
Laurence Olivier Award
for her performance as the Kostelnička Buryjovka
in Janáček's
Jenůfa at the
Royal Opera House.
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Javier Álvarez
(8 May 1956 – 23 May 2023)
composed his first
electroacoustic music,
Temazcal,
in 1984 while studying in London,
using a pair of
maracas
against a complex electroacoustic backdrop.
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The
Kölner Domchor
from the
Cologne Cathedral
sang Palmeri's
Misa a Buenos Aires
at a 2013 festival in Rome dedicated to
Pope Francis,
with the composer at the piano.
Michael Hampe
(3 June 1935 – 18 November 2022),
who directed the
Cologne Opera for 20 years,
was the stage director for the world premiere
of
Henze's adaptation of Monteverdi's
Il ritorno d'Ulisse in patria
at the
Salzburg Festival
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Erasmus Schöfer
(4 June 1931 – 7 June 2022)
chronicled the resistance in Germany,
from the
protests of 1968
to
German reunification,
in a
tetralogy of novels.
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In Strauss'
Elektra,
Aile Asszonyi
was said to be convincing
as a woman close to madness.
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Bach has
a trumpet tell God's glory in
cantata
Die Himmel erzählen die Ehre Gottes, BWV 76,
first performed in the
Thomaskirche
on 6 June 1723,
but
oboe d'amore and
viola da gamba
express "brotherly devotion".
Kurt Widmer
(28 December 1940 – 31 May 2023),
a baritone and influential professor
in Basel,
sang as a soloist with
Gemischter Chor Zürich between 1967 and 1992,
from Bach's
Gott der Herr ist Sonn und Schild, BWV 79,
to Suter's
Le Laudi,
and recorded new
song cycles by
György Kurtág.
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Mozart composed his motet
Ave verum corpus
for the church choir of
St. Stephan in Baden
on 17 June 1791,
for the
Feast of Corpus Christi.
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Haroun and the Sea of Stories,
an opera by
Charles Wuorinen
(9 June 1938 – 11 March 2020),
is based on a children's novel
by
Salman Rushdie
about free imagination in battle with thought control.
Hanns-Martin Schneidt
became head of
an academy of church music in 1955 at age 25,
of the
Münchener Bach-Chor in 1984,
and of a
symphony orchestra in Japan in 2007.
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Jesu, meine Freude
(Jesus, my joy),
a
motet by Bach,
has a complex symmetrical structure
in which six
hymn stanzas
alternate with five
Bible verses.
"
Geh aus, mein Herz, und suche Freud",
written by
Paul Gerhardt
after the
Thirty Years War,
was translated as
"Go forth, my heart, and seek delight".
Tenor
Kurt Equiluz
(13 June 1929 – 20 June 2022)
was the Evangelist
in the first
recording of Bach's
St John Passion
on
period instruments with the
Concentus Musicus Wien, Vienna.
Mezzo-soprano
Hedwig Fassbender,
who also appeared in soprano roles such as Wagner's
Isolde,
has been an influential voice teacher in
Frankfurt.
The
oboist and composer
Rolf Riehm
(born 15 June 1937)
taught music theory
in Frankfurt from 1974 to 2000
and wrote an opera,
Sirenen, for a 2014 premiere at the
Oper Frankfurt.
In 2016
Pascal Rophé
conducted works by
Henri Dutilleux
to celebrate the composer's centenary,
including
Tout un monde lointain... and
Le temps l'horloge.
The
bass-baritone
Albert Dohmen
(born 17 June 1956)
appeared as Berg's
Wozzeck at the
Salzburg Festival in 1997,
and as Wagner's
Pogner at
La Scala in 2017.
Jörg Faerber
(18 June 1929 – 13 September 2022)
was the artistic director of the
Württemberg Chamber Orchestra Heilbronn
for more than four decades
and recorded piano concertos by
Shostakovich and
Haydn with
Martha Argerich.
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With compositions such as
Con brio
and
Babylon,
clarinetist
Jörg Widmann
(born 19 June 1973)
was ranked the third-most-performed
contemporary composer in 2018.
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In his
Viola Sonata
entitled Sonata ebraica (Hebrew Sonata),
Graham Waterhouse quotes the Yiddish song
"
Oyfn Pripetshik".
Gabriele Schnaut
(24 February 1951 – 19 June 2023)
recorded alto parts in
Bach cantatas in the 1970s,
and appeared as Waltraute and Second Norne
in the
Jahrhundertring film in 1980,
as
Isolde in 1985,
and as
Turandot in 2002.
Cornel Țăranu
(20 June 1934 – 18 June 2023),
a Romanian composer, musicologist and
conductor of a
chamber orchestra for
contemporary music,
completed unfinished scores by
George Enescu.
Josef Protschka, who sang as a soloist
in Stockhausen's
Gesang der Jünglinge
at age 12, later appeared in leading
tenor roles
in the Mozart cycle staged by
Jean-Pierre Ponnelle at the
Cologne Opera.
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The concert venues of the
Rheingau Musik Festival
have included
Eberbach Abbey,
Schloss Johannisberg and
St. Martin, Lorch,
from the beginning.
The Company of Heaven,
Benjamin Britten's 1937 composition
about angels
for speakers, soloists, choir and orchestra,
contains "metrical spoken (shouted) male chorus".
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Alte Liebe (Old Love)
is a novel about a couple married for 40 years,
told by a couple married longer but separated,
with chapters written alternately
by
Elke Heidenreich and
Bernd Schroeder
(6 June 1944 – 18 June 2023).
Karlheinz Stockhausen dedicated several compositions to
Doris Stockhausen
(28 February 1924 – 20 June 2023)
beginning with
Chöre für Doris in 1950
before they married.
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Johann Sebastian Bach
reworked music from
more than three decades earlier
for the central piece
Crucifixus
in the symmetrical structure of his
Mass in B minor.
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International opera singer
Soňa Červená
won the
Alfréd Radok Award for Best Actress
when she was 83 years old.
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The 1968 album
Machine Gun by
Peter Brötzmann
(6 March 1941 – 22 June 2023),
titled after his nickname, became
"one of the landmark albums
of 20th-century free jazz".
Benjamin Britten wrote out the
Latin text for
Cantata academica,
commissioned by
Paul Sacher for the quincentenary of the
University of Basel
and premiered 1 July 1960,
in one of his old German
exercise books.
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The
Missa brevis in B-flat,
a
mass for mixed choir, trumpets, trombones,
tubular bells and organ
by
Christopher Tambling,
was premiered by 1,400 singers
at
St. Maria in Landau in 2014.
Rachel Yakar
(3 March 1936 – 24 June 2023),
a French
soprano based for decades at the
Deutsche Oper am Rhein,
appeared in the title role of Monteverdi's
L'incoronazione di Poppea
in the
Oper Zürich production and film
conducted by
Nikolaus Harnoncourt.
Countertenor
Christopher Lowrey
took part in the world premiere of Brett Dean's
Hamlet
in
Glyndebourne in 2017,
and moved with the production to Australia
and the
Metropolitan Opera.
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Diana Tishchenko,
a violinist from Ukraine,
played Skoryk's
Melody
on a tour of the
Kyiv Symphony Orchestra
to Germany
in April 2022.
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In 2016,
Edition Güntersberg
published
12 Fantasias for Viola da Gamba
by
Telemann
that had been lost.
Wolkentanz,
a leading
Hanoverian stallion at the
Celle State Stud,
sired 21 licensed stallions.
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The
Twelve Fantasias for Viola da Gamba solo,
published by the composer
Georg Philipp Telemann in 1735, were believed lost
but published again in 2016.
Leonore von Zadow-Reichling and Günter von Zadow
received the first biennial
Abel Prize of
Köthen
for their efforts to retrieve and publish
compositions by
Carl Friedrich Abel.
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The
a cappella
ensemble amarcord,
five former members of the
Thomanerchor,
won the
CARA award "Best classical album"
again in 2010,
for Rastlose Liebe (Restless Love).
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In
Bio's Bahnhof,
a German live music talk show
presented by
Alfred Biolek
(10 July 1934 – 23 July 2021)
in a former train depot,
Kate Bush made her first television appearance.
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Frank Beermann
conducted the first recording
of
Bruno Maderna's Requiem,
the German premiere
of Péter Eötvös's opera
Love and Other Demons
at the
Chemnitz Opera,
and Beethoven's
Fidelio in 2021.
Director
Frank Stähle
(12 July 1942 – 10 December 2015)
revived the choir and orchestra
of
Dr. Hoch's Konservatorium
and conducted them in
Mozart's Requiem
for the centenary of the
Lutherkirche
in Wiesbaden.
The string quintet Haven of Mysteries
by
Anthony Gilbert
(26 July 1934 – 5 July 2023),
who taught composition both
at the
Royal Northern College of Music and in Australia,
was premiered with the
Arditti Quartet in
Wigmore Hall in 2015.
Graham Clark
(10 November 1941 – 6 July 2023)
appeared at the
Bayreuth Festival in 16 seasons,
in 1988 as Loge and Mime in the
Ring cycle conducted by Daniel Barenboim.
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Violeta Hemsy de Gainza
(25 January 1929 – 7 July 2023),
president of the
Latin American Forum of Musical Education
from its foundation in 1995,
taught generations of students, and said:
"Learning music is a human right".
The title role of
Boris Blacher's last opera,
Yvonne, Prinzessin von Burgund,
is performed by a mute dancer.
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Johann Sebastian Bach
may have reused earlier music
for his
cantata
Erforsche mich, Gott, und erfahre mein Herz,
BWV 136,
for the eighth Sunday after
Trinity
on 18 July 1723.
Martin Janus
wrote the original lyrics of "Jesu, meiner Seelen Wonne",
which Bach used in
Herz und Mund und Tat und Leben, BWV 147,
in a setting known as
Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring.
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When
Heide Simonis
(4 July 1943 – 12 July 2023),
minister of finance in
Schleswig-Holstein from 1988,
became
minister-president there,
she was the first woman to serve
as head of a state government in Germany.
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The walls of the
Kronberg Academy's
Casals Forum,
opened in 2022,
are curved and covered with wood in a manner
reminiscent of a string instrument.
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The
Empress Elisabeth Bridge ,
a 1855
chain bridge over the
Elbe
connecting
Tetschen
to the railroad to
Dresden,
was named in honor of the newly married
Elisabeth of Austria.
Valentin Gheorghiu
(21 March 1928 – 17 July 2023),
later pianist and composer,
won the prize for the best performance
of Enescu's
Violin Sonata No. 3
at the first
George Enescu International Competition
in 1958, with his brother
Ștefan as the violinist.
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Singers
Anne Sofie von Otter and
Christian Gerhaher
(born 24 July 1969)
recorded music written in
the
concentration camp of Terezín
by artists such as
Ilse Weber,
Hans Krása,
Pavel Haas and
Viktor Ullmann.
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After
Tenebrae
received the
Rheingau Musikpreis
during a concert at
Eberbach Abbey,
they performed Talbot's
Path of Miracles,
a 2005 one-hour work for choir
a cappella
inspired by the
Camino de Santiago.
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Romanian
musicologist
Cornel Țăranu
(20 June 1934 – 18 June 2023)
completed unfinished scores by
George Enescu
that Enescu did not wish to publish.
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In 1973
Luten Petrowsky
played the saxophone in a quartet
that made the first record
with jazz musicians from
both East and West Germany.
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Silvana Lattmann,
biologist, poet and author,
published the memoir
Nata il 1918
in 2019.
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Rhythm Is It!
is a 2004 documentary film
about 250 public school students
trained by
Royston Maldoom to dance
Stravinsky's
Le Sacre du printemps
with the
Berlin Philharmonic.
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Paul Gerhardt's song
of thanks and praise
"
Nun danket all und bringet Ehr"
was first published
along with 17 of his other hymns
in 1647,
during the
Thirty Years' War.
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A French team,
with
Patrice Chéreau and
Pierre Boulez,
created the
Jahrhundertring
of
Richard Wagner's
Ring cycle
at the centenary
Bayreuth Festival in 1976,
causing "a near-riot".
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Martin Walser's
Ein fliehendes Pferd
(Runaway Horse),
his most successful book with readers and critics,
was adapted for the screen
in 1986 by
Peter Beauvais,
and again in 2007 by
Rainer Kaufmann.
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Andris Nelsons conducted
Bartok's
Viola Concerto
and
Mahler's
Fifth Symphony
in the final concert with his
Nordwestdeutsche Philharmonie.
pictured:
Jonathon Heyward announcing on 3 March 2022
at the
Stadttheater Minden that the concert
(which included Stavinsky's
The Firebird)
was dedicated to
the victims of the Russian invasion into Ukraine
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Kaiser Wilhelm II
called the
Kurhaus in
Wiesbaden
"the most beautiful spa in the world"
at the opening ceremony.
Beethoven: Violin Concerto
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Felix Mendelssohn
first composed the
motet
Denn er hat seinen Engeln befohlen
(For He shall give His angels charge)
for an eight-part choir,
then included it with orchestra
in
Elijah.
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Nancy Van de Vate's opera
Quiet at the Western Front
was performed at the
New York City Opera.
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After the Ukrainian soprano
Olga Bezsmertna
(born 6 August 1983)
won the
Neue Stimmen competition in 2011,
she was engaged at the
Vienna State Opera.
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Igor Stravinsky
said of his cousin and first wife,
Yekaterina "Katya",
that they were
"closer than lovers sometimes are".
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Mariana Sîrbu,
who played first violin in a string quartet
that she founded as a student in Bucharest in 1967
and moved to Ireland,
was
concertmaster of
I Musici from 1993 to 2003.
The conductor of the
Leningrad premiere of Shostakovich's Symphony No. 7
on 9 August 1942 while the city was
under siege,
performed by the surviving musicians of the
Leningrad Radio Orchestra
supplemented with military performers, concluded:
"we triumphed over the soulless Nazi war machine".
Klesie Kelly,
soprano and academic voice teacher in Cologne,
recorded love songs for voices and instrumental soloists
with tenor
Ian Partridge.
Soprano
Heidi Grant Murphy,
who has given over 200 performances at the
Metropolitan Opera,
said that becoming a singer
"takes work on your psyche, your innermost being".
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The
Überwasserkirche,
a Gothic
hall church in
Münster,
was the location
of the second of three sermons held in 1941
by Bishop
Clemens August Graf von Galen
in defiance of the Nazi regime.
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The "extreme lightness and luminous agility" of
Michael McCown's voice
in the roles of
Britten's
Tempter and
Nebuchadnezzar
has been likened to that of
Peter Pears.
Countertenor
David Erler
was one of five singers invited by
amarcord
for the performance of Monteverdi's
Vespers
as the annual Marienvesper
of the
Rheingau Musik Festival in
Eberbach Abbey.
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After an absence of four years,
the
Inkpot Madonna,
holding a naked Baby Jesus with quill in hand,
returns to the
Hildesheim Cathedral today.
Countertenor
David Erler
was one of five singers invited by
amarcord
for the performance of Monteverdi's
Vespers
as the annual Marienvesper
of the
Rheingau Musik Festival in
Eberbach Abbey.
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Hans-Jochen Jaschke,
who was responsible
for
ecumenism and
inter-religious dialogue
as an
auxiliary bishop of Hamburg,
represented the
Catholic Church
in the media.
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Marie Lehmann,
one of the
Rhinemaidens
at the first
Bayreuth Festival
(13–17 August 1876),
sang the soprano solo
in Beethoven's
Ninth Symphony
for the groundbreaking
of the
Bayreuth Festival Theatre.
Soprano
Rosa Lamoreaux,
who recorded Bach's
Mass in B minor
with
The Bach Choir of Bethlehem and at the
Carmel Bach Festival,
won the 2009 Washington Area Music Award as classical vocal soloist.
Mahler: Second Symphony
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Vilde Frang
(born 19 August 1986)
played Sarasate's
Carmen Fantasy,
with
Mariss Jansons
conducting the
Oslo Philharmonic Orchestra,
at age 13.
Mahler: Fourth Symphony
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Renata Scotto
made her opera debut as
La traviata in Milan,
portrayed
Madama Butterfly
for her debut at the
Met,
and was
Mimi
in the first
Live from the Met telecast
in 1977, alongside
Luciano Pavarotti.
Hans Stadlmair, conductor of the
Münchener Kammerorchester
for almost four decades, in 1971 premiered
Wilhelm Killmayer's Fin al punto,
of which the composer said,
"The calm already contains the catastrophe".
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Claude Debussy
(22 August 1862 – 25 March 1918)
described his
Cello Sonata,
composed within a few weeks
in July 1915 at a
Normandy seaside town,
in a letter to his publisher
Durand
as of "almost classical form".
Vera Nemirova
staged
Lulu at the
Salzburg Festival
and
The Ring for the
Oper Frankfurt.
Conductor
Roland Bader
(born 24 August 1938)
recorded late choral works by
Max Reger,
including his
Hebbel Requiem,
and the First Symphony by
Richard Wetz.
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Thomas Gabriel
(born 25 August 1957)
composed the Missa mundi
for the 2005
World Youth Day,
representing the continents
in style and instrumentation
with
pan flute,
sitar,
drums and
didgeridoo.
Soon after starting her career at the
Metropolitan Opera,
Gwendolyn Killebrew
(August 26, 1941 – December 24, 2021)
appeared as a valkyrie in Wagner's
Die Walküre
in a live broadcast
alongside
Birgit Nilsson in the title role.
Mahler: Ninth Symphony
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The First Symphony "Music on Open Strings"
by
Gloria Coates
was the first composition by a woman
in the Musica Viva series of
Bayerischer Rundfunk.
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Rehearsing
Dvořák's Eighth Symphony,
conductor
Rafael Kubelík said:
"Gentlemen,
in Bohemia
the trumpets never call to battle –
they always call to the dance!".
heard 2013
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When
Berit Lindholm
(18 October 1934 – 12 August 2023),
a
dramatic soprano of the
Royal Swedish Opera,
appeared as
Chrysothemis
at the
Royal Opera House,
a reviewer described her as
"tall, and remarkably slim for so epic a voice".
Berit Lindholm
performed as Wagner's
Isolde
at the
Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow
in a pioneering tour of the
Vienna State Opera
in 1971.
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Beethoven's
Third Cello Sonata,
first performed in 1809,
has been described
as the first sonata for piano and cello
to treat the instruments as equal partners.
16 December 2020
(quirky in the all-Beethoven set)
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Of thrice-married composer
Alma Mahler
(31 August 1879 – 11 December 1964)
Tom Lehrer crooned,
"Alma, tell us!
All modern women are jealous
Which of your magical wands
got you
Gustav and
Walter and
Franz".
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Le Vin herbé,
a 1942 composition by
Frank Martin
of the
Tristan and Iseult story
for twelve vocalists,
seven
strings and
piano,
was staged at the 1948
Salzburg Festival.
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The concert venues of the
Rheingau Musik Festival
have included
Eberbach Abbey
from the beginning,
where the final concert of 2023
is Bruckner's
Seventh Symphony
played by the
Gewandhausorchester
conducted by
Herbert Blomstedt
(born 1927).
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Giuseppe Verdi's
secular cantata
Inno delle nazioni,
his first collaboration with
Arrigo Boito,
contains three national anthems.
In her 2021 composition with string orchestra
This too shall pass
Raminta Šerkšnytė used
a
vibraphone for the flow of time,
a violin for the transience of humans,
and a "heavenly" cello.
When
Robert Hale
appeared as Wagner's
Wotan at the
Kennedy Center in 1989,
a reviewer noted that he captured "the spirit,
from tragic grandeur to ironic detachment,
from flooding tenderness to grim rage".
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Nerotalanlagen,
a park along a creek in
Wiesbaden,
was built in the late 19th century
to enhance the town's spa quality.
Milka Stojanović,
prima donna at the
National Theatre in Belgrade from 1960 to 1993,
performed the
Verdian repertoire worldwide,
including
Leonora,
Amelia and
Aida
at the
Metropolitan Opera.
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Concerts of the
Spannungen
festival of chamber music,
founded by pianist
Lars Vogt
(8 September 1970 – 5 September 2022)
in 1998, are played in a power plant.
The
dramatic soprano
Ute Vinzing
(born 9 September 1936)
made her debut at the
Metropolitan Opera as
Elektra,
and appeared as Brünnhilde in Wagner's
Ring cycle
in Seattle.
Dramatic soprano
Ursula Schröder-Feinen
appeared at the
Bayreuth Festival
as
Senta,
Brünnhilde,
Ortrud and,
with "intensity, ... freshness and spontaneity", as Kundry in
Parsifal.
Walter Arlen
(July 31, 1920 – September 2, 2023),
who escaped the Nazi regime in Vienna
for the United States in 1939,
enjoyed the first recording of his compositions, for voice and piano, at age 92.
Anatol Ugorski
(28 September 1942 – 5 September 2023),
who had played piano music by controversial Western composers
such as
Pierre Boulez in the Soviet Union,
made his first recording, of Beethoven's
Diabelli Variations, in 1991.
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The pianist
Clara Schumann,
(13 September 1819 – 20 May 1896)
who toured Europe for decades,
taught 68 students at
Dr. Hoch's,
including those from Britain and the U.S..
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Margherita Rinaldi
(12 January 1935 – 7 September 2023)
made her debut as Donizetti's
Lucia di Lammermoor in 1958,
prompting a career at
La Scala in Milan where she appeared
as Giulietta in Bellini's
I Capuleti e i Montecchi
alongside
Luciano Pavarotti.
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Soprano
Jessye Norman
(15 September 1945 – 30 September 2019),
whose voice was described
as a "grand mansion of sound",
performed at
U.S. presidential inaugurations
and sang
La Marseillaise
at the
French Revolution's bicentennial.
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Wolfgang J. Fuchs
(16 September 1945 – 20 January 2020),
an early German
comics scholar
who co-wrote a 1971 standard work on the topic,
translated
Garfield
and
Mom's Cancer.
The
tenor
Graham Clark
appeared at the
Bayreuth Festival in 16 seasons,
portraying the characters Loge and Mime
in the 1988
Ring cycle.
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Grischa Huber
(18 September 1944 – 6 April 2021)
played Grischa in
Under the Pavement Lies the Strand,
regarded as
"a cult film in the feminist movement".
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After the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
shared the
Nobel Peace Prize, contributing author
Raymond Arritt
(September 19, 1957 – November 14, 2018)
said, "It's kind of neat:
I have, like, .002 percent of a Nobel prize now".
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Georg Christoph Biller (r.)
(20 September 1955 – 27 January 2022)
was the
Thomaskantor,
the conductor of the Thomanerchor in Leipzig,
the 16th successor of
Johann Sebastian Bach
in this position.
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Elisabeth Rethberg
(22 September 1894 – 6 June 1976)
a
soprano
whose career began in Saxony,
became
Aida
at
La Scala in Milan,
conducted by
Toscanini.
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With the growth of the
Werl pilgrimage
to a statue of
Mary,
a large
Romanesque Revival basilica
was built adjacent to
the former
Baroque church (pictured).
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For the morning song
"
Die güldne Sonne
voll Freud und Wonne",
the poet found a new
metre,
and
the composer a new melody,
to reflect the many meanings of "rising".
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Stephen Gould,
an American
heldentenor,
performed around 100 times at the
Bayreuth Festival,
especially as
Tannhäuser,
Siegfried, and
Tristan,
all three even in one year in 2022.
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A
loop from the anthem
O clap your hands,
a setting of verses from
Psalm 47
by
Ralph Vaughan Williams
for choir, brass, organ and percussion,
was used by the Beatles for "
Revolution 9".
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Kloster Gnadenthal
(buildings pictured)
was a
Cistercian nunnery from 1235,
a Protestant women's
Stift from 1564,
and became an ecumenical community
in 1969.
François Glorieux
(27 August 1932 – 22 September 2023)
was a Belgian pianist and improvisor, touring with
André Cluytens,
conductor of the
BBC Radio Orchestra, the
Stan Kenton band,
and four ensembles that he founded,
composer, and arranger for
Michael Jackson.
The Company of Heaven,
about angels, composed by
Benjamin Britten
for speakers, soloists, choir and orchestra,
and first aired by the
BBC on
Michaelmas,
29 September 1937,
contains "metrical spoken (shouted) male chorus".
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The
Kreuzkapelle
above
Bad Camberg,
a pilgrimage chapel
dedicated to the
Holy Cross,
has a floor plan of a
Greek cross.
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"
Wir pflügen und wir streuen"
('We plow and sow'),
with words by
Matthias Claudius,
began as a song of a fictional harvest festival,
and is now a Protestant hymn
for
Erntedankfest.
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Dona nobis pacem
is a
cantata by
Ralph Vaughan Williams,
first performed on 2 October 1936,
a plea for peace with texts taken
from the
Mass, poems by
Walt Whitman,
a political speech, and sections of the Bible.
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Haydn's oratorio
The Creation
is
structured in three parts,
the first two about
the
creation as narrated in Genesis,
and the third about
Adam and Eve in
Paradise.
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Swiss composer
Hermann Suter's
symphonic
oratorio
Le Laudi
(The Praises)
is a setting of
St. Francis of Assisi's
Italian
Canticle of the Sun
for choir, soloists,
voci di ragazzi,
organ and orchestra.
Tenor
Daniel Behle
had a single day to learn rarely performed
romantic duets
when he stepped in at short notice
for a 2018
Rheingau Musik Festival concert with
Annette Dasch.
Claus Wisser
founded the services company Wisag,
and co-founded the
Rheingau Musik Festival
which staged a concert of Orff's
Carmina Burana for his 60th birthday.
Russell Sherman, a classical pianist
who taught at the
New England Conservatory for more than half a century,
wrote about music by
Franz Liszt:
"The poetic idea is central, and the virtuoso elements
become so many layers to orchestrate the poetic content".
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Tabea Zimmermann
(born 8 October 1966)
prepared her own version of Bartók's
Viola Concerto
from the composer's sketches,
and played it at the
Casals Forum,
with the
Frankfurt Radio Symphony
conducted by
Christoph Eschenbach.
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Alain Altinoglu
(born 9 October 1975)
conducted the opening concert of the
2023
Rheingau Musik Festival
at
Eberbach Abbey,
featuring Poulenc's
Stabat Mater
with the
MDR Rundfunkchor
and the
Frankfurt Radio Symphony.
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The
baritone
Björn Bürger
(born 10 October 1985),
who won the
Bundeswettbewerb Gesang Berlin in 2012,
performed the title role
in Arnulf Herrmann's
Der Mieter
in its 2017 world premiere
at the
Oper Frankfurt.
Jacqueline Dark,
a
mezzo-soprano with
Opera Australia for a while,
won awards for portraying Mozart's
Donna Elvira and Strauss's
Herodias,
and toured Australia and New Zealand
as Mother Abbess in
The Sound of Music,
with "a stunning rendition of '
Climb Ev'ry Mountain'".
Reiner Goldberg,
a
heldentenor who performed
Wagner-roles worldwide,
was a member of the
Berlin State Opera from 1972,
appeared as Aron in the iconic production
of Schoenberg's
Moses und Aron
of the
Dresden State Opera in 1975,
and sang
Parsifal in the
1982 Syberberg film
"with a youthful radiance
that is precisely that of the chaste madman".
Maurice Bourgue.
principal oboist with the
Orchestre de Paris from its foundation in 1967,
and professor of
chamber music at the
Conservatoire de Paris,
played in world premieres such as Les Citations by
Henri Dutilleux,
and Poulenc's
Oboe Sonata with friends.
When
Robert Hale
performed as
Wagner's Wotan in Washington,
a reviewer noted that he commanded
"the spirit, from tragic grandeur to ironic detachment,
from flooding tenderness to grim rage".
Jorge Lavelli
introduced the French audience to the Polish playwright
Witold Gombrowicz,
directing his
The Marriage in 1963 for a competition,
and his 1975 staging of Gounod's
Faust for the
Paris Opera,
set during World War I, was played until 2003.
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"
Glauben können wie du"
(Believing like you),
a hymn by
Helmut Schlegel,
is addressed to
Mary,
and relates to her exemplary
faith, hope and love.
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Tenor
Thomas Mohr,
who sang the roles
of Loge, Siegmund, and Siegfried
in
Der Ring in Minden,
and Florestan in
Fidelio in Hamm,
hosts concerts in his cowshed.
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Walls and the ceiling of the
Unionskirche
(Union Church)
in
Idstein are covered
with 38 oil paintings
from the
Dutch Golden Age school
of
Rubens.
To include the popular
Marian hymn
"
Maria zu lieben, ist allzeit mein Sinn"
(To love Mary is always on my mind)
in
the first common Catholic hymnal in German,
Friedrich Dörr retained only its first line.
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In 2023,
a sculpture garden in
Praunheim
displayed abstract works by
Hans Steinbrenner
from different periods of his life,
and corresponding works
by his friends and students.
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"'"
("Call it causelessly merry")
was one of about 40 poems
by
Mascha Kaléko
set to music on a 2011 album.
"Ich freu mich, daß am Himmel Wolken ziehen"
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The opening chorus
of
Bach's cantata
Schmücke dich, o liebe Seele, BWV 180,
has been regarded as
"perfectly tailored to the idea of the soul
dressing itself up in all its wedding finery".
Hatto Beyerle,
the founding violist of the
Alban Berg Quartet,
taught
chamber music in
Vienna,
Hannover and
Basel,
and initiated and directed the
European Chamber Music Academy in 2004.
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Carmen Petra Basacopol
a musicologist who taught
at the
National University of Music Bucharest
between 1962 and 2003,
and at the Rabat Conservatoire,
composed operas for children
and chamber music for flute and harp.
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Elsa Reger
(25 October 1870 – 3 May 1951),
who had first rejected
Max Reger's courting,
titled her autobiography
Mein Leben mit und für Max Reger
(My life with and for Max Reger).
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Pianist
Miku Nishimoto-Neubert,
a prize winner
of the
Leipzig Bach Competition,
has been described as
"moving between capricious high spirits
and a meditative inwardness"
Alkan: Cello Sonata
Michael Schneider
conducted an oratorio by
Alessandro Stradella,
performed by students and teachers of the
Frankfurt University of Music
at
Eberbach Abbey for the
Rheingau Musik Festival.
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Isabelle Cals,
who turned to singing after a degree in Chinese,
appeared as Wagner's Kundry
in a production of
Parsifal
at the
Stadttheater Minden
In
Der Ring in Minden,
the orchestra played at the back of the stage,
and the singers all turned towards it
to listen to the music
at the end.
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Percy Grainger,
who left Australia at the age of 13
to attend
Hoch's Conservatorium,
played a prominent role in the revival
of interest in British folk music
in the course of a long and innovative career.
István Láng,
an Hungarian composer,
teacher of
chamber music at the
Franz Liszt Academy of Music
and member of the bord of
ISCM,
wrote theatrical music even in concert pieces.
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John Eliot Gardiner performed
Bach's cantatas for
Reformation Day
in the
Schloßkirche, Wittenberg,
including
Gott der Herr ist Sonn und Schild, BWV 79.
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Herr, unser Herr, wie bist du zugegen,
a "song of God's presence"
written in 1965 in Dutch
by
Huub Oosterhuis
(1 November 1933 – 9 April 2023),
became part of
the first
common German Catholic hymnal,
and was retained in
the second
by popular demand.
After signing the
Camp David Accords in 1978,
Prime Minister
Menachem Begin ended a speech
with a desire to sing the peace song
"
Hevenu shalom aleichem"
with the people of Israel.
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Zdeněk Mácal,
a promising Czech conductor,
left his home country in 1968
and was chief conductor of orchestras
in Germany, Australia and the United States,
returning to Prague to lead
the
Czech Philharmonic from 2003.
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Jesu, meine Freude
(Jesus, my joy),
a
motet by Bach,
has a complex symmetrical structure
in which six
hymn stanzas
alternate with five
Bible verses.
The hymn
"
Jesu, meine Freude"
by
Johann Franck and
Johann Crüger
mentions singing in defiance
of the "old dragon", death, and fear.
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On 6 November 2016
Peter Reulein conducted
the premiere of his oratorio
Laudato si',
described as a Franciscan
Magnificat,
with more than 250 performers
at the
Limburg Cathedral.
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Bach composed four dialogues
for his
cantata
O Ewigkeit, du Donnerwort, BWV 60,
first performed 7 November 1723,
three between Fear and Hope,
and one between Fear and the
Voice of Christ.
Eric Sams remarked
"what bride ever had a finer wedding gift?"
of the song collection
Myrthen (Myrtles),
which
Robert Schumann dedicated to
Clara.
Astrid Schirmer
(born 8 November 1942)
appeared in roles by Richard Wagner,
both Venus and Elisabeth in his
Tannhäuser,
and in the Bayreuth
Jahrhundertring as both Ortlinde and Sieglinde.
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In the fairy-tale opera
Der Schuhu und die fliegende Prinzessin
by
Udo Zimmermann,
two orchestras play on stage,
representing two empires in conflict.
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The first stanza of the
hymn
"
Nun bitten wir den Heiligen Geist",
asking the
Holy Spirit
for the right faith most of all,
is documented in German
in the 13th century,
and the later three,
by
Martin Luther
(10 November 1483 – 18 February 1546),
relate to
faith, love and hope.
|
11 November - St. Martin's Day
Two
conductors
shared performances
of Verdi's
Messa da Requiem
in
St. Martin, Idstein.
Mozart: Lacrymosa
Harald Heckmann
(6 December 1924 – 5 November 2023),
a German
musicologist focused on source documentation,
established the German Archive for the History of Music
and promoted international exchange in leading positions
of
Répertoire International des Sources Musicales (RISM)
and many other organisations.
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"
Mir nach, spricht Christus, unser Held"
(Follow me, says Christ, our hero)
is a
Christian hymn in German
with a text by
Angelus Silesius
that uses sayings of
Jesus in
direct speech.
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In 2016,
Edition Güntersberg
published
Twelve Fantasias for Viola da Gamba solo
by
Georg Philipp Telemann
that had been lost.
Leonore von Zadow-Reichling and Günter von Zadow (r.)
received the first biennial
Abel Prize of
Köthen
for their efforts to retrieve and publish
compositions by
Carl Friedrich Abel.
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Kurdish civil engineer and politician
Hevrin Khalaf
(15 November 1984 – 12 October 2019) ,
who worked for tolerance
among Christians, Arabs, and Kurds,
was killed in the
2019 Turkish offensive into Syria.
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The 1964 church
for the new parish
Zu den heiligen Engeln
(To the Holy Angels)
in
Hannover
was designed by
Josef Bieling
to symbolize the
tent of God among men.
Nun bitten wir den Heiligen Geist
Nun danket all und bringet Ehr
Soprano
Rachel Yakar,
who received international attention in 1977
as
Poppea with
Nikolaus Harnoncourt,
was also described as an "ideal"
Mélisande
and "a Mozartian at heart and in style".
|
Andris Nelsons
(born 18 November 1978)
conducted
Bartok's
Viola Concerto
and Mahler's
Fifth Symphony
in the final concert with his
Nordwestdeutsche Philharmonie.
In 2008
Naji Hakim composed
variations for
oboe and
organ
on Philipp Nicolai's
chorale
"
Wie schön leuchtet der Morgenstern",
published in 1599.
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Claude Kahn
(9 November 1935 – 17 November 2023),
who won the
Franz Liszt Competition at age 15,
founded and directed
a piano competition in his name in 1970,
and the conservatoire of
Antibes in 1971.
|
Two
conductors
shared performances
of Verdi's
Messa da Requiem
in
St. Martin, Idstein.
Palmeri:
Misatango
Reulein:
Te Deum
look and listen to us
Benjamin Britten
(22 November 1913 – 4 December 1976),
composed
Canticle I: My beloved is mine and I am his
for the tenor voice of
Peter Pears,
using poetry from
A Divine Rapture by
Francis Quarles.
|
Thanksgiving
Lea Ackermann,
a German nun of the
Missionary Sisters of Our Lady of Africa,
fought against
forced prostitution and
sex tourism
in East Africa.
Colette Maze,
the last pianist who studied with
Alfred Cortot,
recorded music by
Claude Debussy,
who was still alive when she was born in 1914,
in 2023.
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Burgenland Croat sculptor
Thomas Resetarits
(25 November 1939 – 18 May 2022)
created
Stations of the Cross.
Director
Frank Stähle revived
the choir and orchestra of
Dr. Hoch's Konservatorium
and conducted them in
Mozart's Requiem
for the centenary of the
Lutherkirche in Wiesbaden.
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Jerome Kohl
(November 27, 1946 – August 4, 2020),
a music theorist of the
University of Washington,
was recognized internationally
as an authority on the composer
Karlheinz Stockhausen,
publishing a book on his
Zeitmaße in 2017.
François Glorieux
was a Belgian pianist and improvisor,
conductor of the
BBC Radio Orchestra and
Stan Kenton's band,
and arranger for
Michael Jackson.
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Contralto
Sonia Prina
(born 30 November 1975)
performed the title role
of Antonio Vivaldi's 1727 opera
Orlando furioso
at the
Oper Frankfurt,
staged as a
rocker.
American lyric tenor
Douglas Ahlstedt,
who appeared as a child as Miles
in the U.S. premiere of Britten's
The Turn of the Screw,
performed at the
Met 191 times,
before and after he was a member
of the
Deutsche Oper am Rhein.
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Bernard Ładysz,
a
bass-baritone who performed in world premieres
of
Krzysztof Penderecki's music
in Hamburg and
in Salzburg,
was the only Polish singer to appear with
Maria Callas
(2 December 1923 – 16 September 1977).
Andréa Guiot appeared internationally
in French
soprano roles
such as
Mireille,
Marguerite,
Manon,
and Micaëla in Bizet's
Carmen,
which she recorded alongside
Maria Callas
in the title role.
The
Advent song
"
Macht hoch die Tür"
(Fling wide the door),
with text by
Georg Weissel written for the inauguration of
the church
where he would be ordained pastor a week later,
is number 1 in the
German Protestant hymnal.
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Conductor Dessauer and composer Mawby (r.), 2012 |
Gabriel Dessauer
(born 4 December 1955)
conducted the premiere of Reger's
Hebbel Requiem
in the organ version of
Max Beckschäfer
with
a project choir at the
Marktkirche in Wiesbaden.
The prolific composer and
Westminster Cathedral conductor
Colin Mawby
said, "I cannot write choral music unless I work with choirs ...
I have to write for particular people".
Christof Loy
(born 5 December 1962)
received the 2008
Der Faust award as best opera director
for staging Mozart's
Così fan tutte at the
Oper Frankfurt.
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Wilhelm II,
German Emperor,
called the
Kurhaus in Wiesbaden
"the most beautiful spa in the world"
at the opening ceremony.
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Ignace Michiels
(born 7 December 1963)
of the
St. Salvator's Cathedral in Bruges
has been the
organist
for the German-Flemish
Reger-Chor
in works such as Reger's
Requiem.
Reger: Der 100. Psalm
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Max Reger
composed "in new simplicity"
Unser lieben Frauen Traum,
a
motet suitable for
Advent,
about a dream of
Mary
of a tree growing in her.
Medea Amiranashvili,
a Georgian operatic
soprano and academic teacher,
portrayed characters such as
Revaz Lagidze's Lela,
Verdi's Leonora in
Il trovatore and Puccini's
Madama Butterfly,
with "fierce inner expression".
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In 1973
Luten Petrowsky
(10 December 1933 – 10 July 2023)
played the saxophone in a quartet
that made the first record
with jazz musicians
from both East and West Germany.
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The lawyer
Wolfgang Wieland,
a co-founder of the Berlin
Greens
and their speaker in the city parliament,
represented the joint plaintiff
in the
Mykonos restaurant assassinations.
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The
Advent hymn
"
O Heiland, reiß die Himmel auf"
(O Saviour, tear open the heavens)
was written against a backdrop
of the
Thirty Years' War, the
plague,
and
witch trials.
Rabbi
Michael Robinson
(December 13, 1924 – July 20, 2006)
and 15 other
Reform rabbis
were arrested and jailed after answering Martin Luther King's
call to stand with him for civil rights in St. Augustine, Florida.
Wolfgang Rennert
conducted the world premieres
of Louise Talma's
Die Alkestiade at the
Oper Frankfurt
and
Rainer Kunad's Sabellicus at the
Staatsoper Berlin.
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Erna Berger sang the title role
of Smetana's
The Bartered Bride
in a 1955 recording with
Wilhelm Schüchter
(15 December 1911 – 27 May 1974)
and the
Nordwestdeutsche Philharmonie.
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Prince Nikolaus Esterházy,
who commissioned
Beethoven's
Mass in C major
for his wife's
name day,
found it "unbearably ridiculous and detestable".
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In 2018
Lydia Steier,
born in
Hartford, Connecticut,
became the first woman
to stage Mozart's
Die Zauberflöte
at the
Salzburg Festival.
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Martin Luther's hymn
"
Mit Fried und Freud ich fahr dahin",
a reflection of the
canticle of Simeon,
is the base of funeral music
by Schütz, Buxtehude and Bach.
"
Mit Ernst, o Menschenkinder",
a 1642
Advent hymn,
includes a call to penitence
that
John the Baptist took
from the prophet
Isaiah.
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The German
Advent song
"
Tochter Zion, freue dich"
has words by
Friedrich Heinrich Ranke
set to music used
for triumphant entrances
in two of
Handel's
oratorios.
Soprano
Nadine Secunde
(born 21 December 1953)
was praised for "formidable acting skills"
in the title role of Dmitri Shostakovich's
Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk.
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Der neue
Catalogue of Works of Carl Friedrich Abel
wurde 2023 in Köthen vorgestellt,
wo der Gambist
vor 300 Jahren geboren wurde.
The new
Catalogue of Works of Carl Friedrich Abel
(AbelWV)
was introduced in
Köthen,
where the
viol virtuoso was born
on 22 December 1723.
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Gunther Emmerlich,
bass singer and television presenter,
appeared as Kuno
in the performance of Weber's
Der Freischütz
to open the restored
Semperoper.
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On Christmas Eve in 1818,
the Christmas carol
"Stille Nacht"
("
Silent Night")
was first performed in the
Nikolauskirche
in
Oberndorf, Austria.
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"
Verbum caro factum est",
a Christmas
motet for six voices
by
Hans Leo Hassler
in the
Venetian polychoral style,
has been arranged
for
brass ensembles.
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Bach's cantata for the second day of Christmas,
Darzu ist erschienen der Sohn Gottes
("For this the Son of God appeared"),
BWV 40,
is his first
Christmas cantata
composed for Leipzig.
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Bach has
a choir of
trombones double
the choir in
his cantata
Sehet, welch eine Liebe hat uns der Vater erzeiget, BWV 64,
for the
Third Day of Christmas,
dedicated to
John the Evangelist
and first performed on 27 December 1723.
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Diethard Hellmann
(28 December 1928 – 14 October 1999),
the director of church music at the
Christuskirche in Mainz,
reconstructed the music
of the lost
Bach cantata for the Third Sunday in
Advent,
Ärgre dich, o Seele, nicht, BWV 186a.
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Rebekka Habermas,
a German historian
at the
University of Göttingen,
who also taught
in Paris, Montreal and New York,
focused on people
in the social and cultural conditions
of 19th-century Germany.
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Heike Matthiesen
recorded a 2016 album
Guitar Ladies
of compositions for guitar solo by women
including Sidney Pratten (1821–1895),
María Luisa Anido,
Ida Presti,
Sofia Gubaidulina,
Sylvie Bodorová,
Annette Kruisbrink, and
Maria Linnemann
who had dedicated her work to the player.
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A German theologian wrote
"
Vertraut den neuen Wegen"
(Trust the new ways)
to the melody of
Lob Gott getrost mit Singen
(Praise God confidently with singing)
to be sung at a wedding in
Eisenach
shortly before the
fall of the Wall.