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Latest

Composers Datebook®

with host John Birge

A battle for Verdi

In 1848, when revolutions convulsed Europe, the Italian opera composer Giuseppe Verdi wrote these lines to a friend: "Imagine whether I wanted to stay in Paris when I heard that there was a revolution in Milan! I left immediately when I heard the news, but I've been unable to see anything except...Episode details...

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John Birge takes over as host of 'Composers Datebook'

John Birge is the new host of 'Composers Datebook,' the award-winning program about this day in classical music history. A well-known name at Classical Minnesota Public Radio, he will take over from retiring and longtime host John Zech on May 1.

Harris's "1933" in 1934

This is the Composers Datebook for January 26th. I’m John Birge. In 1933, Aaron Copland introduced Roy Harris to Serge Koussevitzky, the famous conductor of the Boston Symphony in those days. Now, Koussevitzky was one of the great patrons of American music and was always looking for new...Episode details...

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Strauss raw and cooked

On today’s date in 1909, Richard Strauss’s opera “Elektra” had its premiere in Dresden. The libretto, a free adaptation of the grim, ancient Greek tragedy by Sophocles, was by the Austrian poet and playwright Hugo von Hofmannsthal. In ancient Greek tragedies, violence occurred off-stage, and for...Episode details...

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Stravinsky (and Newman) at the movies

On this day in 1946, Igor Stravinsky conducted the New York Philharmonic in the first performance of his “Symphony in Three Movements,” a work inspired in part by World War II newsreels. “Each episode in the Symphony,” Stravinsky wrote, “is linked in my imagination with a specific...Episode details...

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Field the Claveciniste

On today’s date in 1837, the Dublin-born pianist and composer John Field breathed his last in Moscow at the age of 54. Born in 1782 into musical family, Field soon moved to London to study with the Italian composer Muzio Clementi and became a sought-after concert artist at a very tender age....Episode details...

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Bach's 2- and 3-part Inventions

As kids, many of us received home-made presents: a sweater or pair of socks, perhaps, or—if you were unlucky—a crocheted bow tie you were forced to wear when Auntie came to visit. On today's date in 1720, Johann Sebastian Bach started a home-made present for his 9-year old son, Wilhelm...Episode details...

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Brahms breaks the rules

The first Piano Concerto by Brahms received its premiere public performance on today’s date in 1858 with the Hanover Court Orchestra under the direction of Brahms’s close friend Joseph Joachim and its 25-year composer as soloist. That first night audience had never heard anything quite like it. ...Episode details...

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Poulenc's "Gloria"

On today’s date in 1961, the French composer Francis Poulenc was in Boston for the premiere of his new choral work. It was a setting a Latin text “Gloria in excelsis Deo” or “Glory to God in the Highest.” These days Poulenc’s “Gloria” is regarded as one of his finest works, but back in 1961,...Episode details...

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