Johann Sebastian Bach was born into a musical dynasty. The Bach family had over 300 years‘ worth of professional composers and musicians, but Johann Sebastian was the most famous of […]
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Concertos got their start in 17th century Italy. The history of violin concertos follows the history of great violinists.
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Robert and Clara Schumann were a husband and wife musician/composer team. But theirs was not the only family in which musician were linked by marriage. Others include Dvorak/Suk, Wagner/Liszt, Mozart/Weber, […]
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There are many pieces of classical music — besides „The Flight of the Bumblebee“ — that are about bees, birds, and other winged creatures. Composers use various instruments to imitate […]
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Guiseppe Verdi — „Joe Green,“ in Italian — was a great opera composer and Italian patriot. His music became part of the Italian fight for independence and unity.
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Prokofiev was not the only classical composer to paint a musical portrait of a sleigh ride on a snowy day. Listen as we take you through several other examples of […]
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Russian composer Igor Stravinsky had a big hit with his first ballet, The Firebird. Stravinksy kept on writing ballets, followed by operas, and orchestral and choral music.
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Georg Philipp Telemann composed during the Baroque period, which ran from about 1600 to 1750. Suzanne Bona, host of the National Public Radio program Sunday Baroque, talks with Naomi Lewin […]
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Usually, an overture is a piece of music played at the beginning of a play, opera or ballet in order to set the mood. But there are also other kinds […]
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Even though classical music is sometimes referred to as „serious music,“ a lot of times it just isn’t. Serious, that is — classical composers wrote some very funny music.
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