Composers Datebook®

Ligeti in Salzburg

Composers Datebook - July 28, 2024
DOWNLOAD

Synopsis

In the decades since its founding in 1920, the annual Salzburg Music Festival in Austria has earned a well-deserved reputation as one of the best — and priciest — summertime music venues in the world. The core repertory of the Festival has always been the music of Salzburg’s most famous native son, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, and other classical and romantic masters from the Austro-Germanic tradition.

Fearing that the Salzburg Festival was becoming a bit too conservative and predictable, in the 1990s the festival’s directors began shake things up by including some challenging contemporary classics into the mix. On today’s date in 1997, for example, a car-horn overture signaled the Salzburg Festival premiere of a revised version of György Ligeti’s opera La Grand Macabre.

In Ligeti’s opera, the world is fast approaching apocalypse, and the ultimate catastrophe is overseen by a rather ineffectual, and occasionally tipsy Grim Reaper. The libretto is silly and serious at the same time, and was devised by the composer and Michael Meschke, a master puppeteer. For the 1997 Salzburg production, the American director Peter Sellars set the work in a devastated Chernobyl-like landscape contaminated by a nuclear disaster.

Music Played in Today's Program

György Ligeti (1923-2006): Mysteries of the Macabre, from Le Grand Macabre; Sibylle Ehlert, soprano; Philharmonia Orchestra; Esa-Pekka Salonen, conductor; Sony 62311

On This Day

Births

  • 1893 - Danish composer Rued Langgaard, in Copenhagen

Deaths

  • 1750 - German composer Johann Sebastian Bach, 65, in Leipzig. He died “a little after” 8:15 p.m. and was buried at St. John’s cemetery on either July 30 or 31. In 1894 his body was exhumed, examined, and reburied in the Leipzig’s St. Thomas Church, where he had served as Kantor.

  • 1838 - Finnish composer Bernard Henrik Crusell, 62, in Stockholm

  • 1969 - American songwriter and musical composer Frank Loesser, 59, in New York City

Premieres

  • 1717 - Handel: Water Music on the river Thames (Julian date: July 17)

  • 1823 - Spohr: opera Jessonda, in Kassel

  • 1840 - Berlioz: Symphonie Funebre et Triomphale, in Paris, with the composer conducting (with a sword) over 200 marching musicians

Others

  • 1741 - In Vienna, burial of Italian composer and violinist Antonio Vivaldi

  • 1850 - To mark the centenary of the composer’s death, The Bach Gesellschaft is founded in Leipzig. Their goal is to publish a complete edition of Bach’s works.

  • 1954 - Premiere of Columbia Pictures film On the Waterfront, with a score by Leonard Bernstein

  • 1997 - Ligeti: opera La Grand Macabre (revised version), in Salzburg at the Grosses Festpielhaus

Love the music?

Donate by phone
1-800-562-8440

Show your support by making a gift to YourClassical.

Each day, we’re here for you with thoughtful streams that set the tone for your day – not to mention the stories and programs that inspire you to new discovery and help you explore the music you love.

YourClassical is available for free, because we are listener-supported public media. Take a moment to make your gift today.

More Ways to Give

Your Donation

$5/month
$10/month
$15/month
$20/month
$

Latest Composers Datebook® Episodes

VIEW ALL EPISODES

Latest Composers Datebook® Episodes

YourClassical
2:00
Get Composers Datebook in your inbox
YourClassical

Sousa gets stiffed in Minneapolis

John Philip Sousa (1854-1932): ‘Foshay Tower (Washington Memorial) March’; Great American Main Street Band; Timothy Foley, conductor; EMI/Angel 54130

2:00
YourClassical

John Cage at Woodstock

John Cage (1912-1992): Nos. 5 and 12, from ‘Sonatas and Interludes for Prepared Piano’; Robert Miller, piano; New World 80203

2:00
YourClassical

Liszt and Milhaud celebrate Goethe

Franz Liszt (1811-1886): ‘Tasso’; Orchestre de Paris; Georg Solti, conductor; London 417 513 Darius Milhaud (1892-1974): ‘Aspen Serenade,’ Stuttgart Radio Symphony; Gilbert Varga, conductor; CPO 999114

2:00
YourClassical
2:00
YourClassical

A Song for Anne-Sophie

Andre Previn (1929-2019): ‘Tango Song and Dance III. Dance’; Lambert Okis, piano; Anne-Sophie Mutter, violin; DG 8143

2:00
YourClassical

Bach's Letter

J.S. Bach (1685-1750): ‘Weichet Nur,’ from ‘Wedding Cantata’ No. 202; Elly Ameling, soprano; Academy of St. Martin in the Fields; Neville Marriner, conductor; EMI Classics

2:00
YourClassical

Pomp and the MJQ

Edward Elgar (1857-1934): ‘Pomp and Circumstance’ No. 4; London Philharmonic; Daniel Barenboim, conductor; Sony Classical 60789 Milt Jackson (1923-1999): ‘Blues in C’; Modern Jazz Quartet; Atlantic 1652

2:00
YourClassical
2:00
VIEW ALL EPISODES

About Composers Datebook®

Host John Birge presents a daily snapshot of composers past and present, with timely information, intriguing musical events and appropriate, accessible music related to each.

He has been hosting, producing and performing classical music for more than 25 years. Since 1997, he has been hosting on Minnesota Public Radio's Classical Music Service. He played French horn for the Cincinnati Symphony and Pops Orchestra and performed with them on their centennial tour of Europe in 1995. He was trained at the Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, Eastman School of Music and Interlochen Arts Academy.

About Composers Datebook®
YourClassical Radio
0:00
0:00