„In The Hall of the Mountain King“ is part of the incidental music Edvard Grieg wrote for Henrik Ibsen’s play Peer Gynt. Hear the story of the play as you […]
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George Gershwin wrote his Rhapsody in Blue in a big hurry, after he saw a newspaper announcement saying that he was writing a jazz concerto for a concert taking place […]
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Music by composers from the three official Scandinavian countries — Norway, Denmark and Sweden — and a couple of unofficial ones — Finland and Iceland!
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By the time Dmitri Kabalevsky was 14, the Russian Revolution had turned his country into a communist state. In spite of the Soviet Union’s control over artists of all kinds, […]
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Benjamin Britten was asked to compose music for a film that explained the instruments of the orchestra to children. Britten borrowed a tune by one of his favorite composers, Henry […]
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Igor Stravinsky based his ballet The Firebird on a Russian folk tale about an evil demon named Kashchei, who has thirteen princesses under his spell. A prince who wanders into […]
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Fanny Mendelssohn, Felix Mendelssohn’s older sister, was a talented pianist and composer. So was Clara Schumann, wife of composer Robert Schumann. Also featured: music of Elizabeth-Claude Jacquet de la Guerre, […]
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In the „Farandole“ from Georges Bizet’s Arlésienne Suite, there are examples of all three kinds of harmonic texture: monophony, homophony, and polyphony. Hear those terms explained in words and in […]
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Depicting a thunderstorm in music was one of Rossini’s specialties. Here are some more examples of musical thunderstorms.
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Vivaldi is not the only composer who wrote music about the seasons, or about spring. Many other composers wrote springtime music.
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