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# **Gounod - Symphonies Nos. 1 & 2 - Iceland SO, Yan Pascal Tortelier ** [https://www.patreon.com/posts/gounod-nos-1-2-146349458?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link](https://www.patreon.com/posts/gounod-nos-1-2-146349458?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link) ## **Charles Gounod and the Symphony: An Unlikely Encounter** Although today **Charles Gounod** is remembered above all as…

# **Bruno Walter: Anecdotes and Curiosities from a Life in Music (1876–1962)** **Early Debut and Unusual Seriousness (1893)** Bruno Walter, born **Bruno Schlesinger** on **15 September 1876**, made his conducting debut at the age…

# **José de Nebra (1702–1768): Life, Works, and Historical Significance** **1. Family Origins and Early Formation (1702–c.1720)** **José Melchor Baltasar Gaspar Nebra Blasco** was born on **6 January 1702** in **Calatayud (Aragón)** into a…

# **Mozart Beyond Music: The Art of Living as Creative Fuel ** Mozart’s life outside music was far richer and more human than the legend of the isolated prodigy suggests. He did not retreat…

# **Mozart: Composing the *****Requiem***** under a Sense of Fatality** During the final months of his life in 1791, as Mozart worked on the *Requiem*, he developed an increasingly explicit conviction that the work…

# **Laughter While Composing Tragedy: Mozart and *****Don Giovanni*** One of the most disconcerting—and revealing—features of Mozart’s personality, as reported by contemporaries, is the apparent contradiction between **the gravity of his artistic creations and…

# **Pinchas Zukerman — A Life in 20 Chapters** **Chapter 1 — Origins in Tel Aviv (1948–1957)** Pinchas Zukerman was born in Tel Aviv in 1948 into a family where music was not an…

# **Handel - Lotario - Opera - 1729 **- **Laurence Cummings ** [https://www.patreon.com/posts/handel-lotario-145844033?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link](https://www.patreon.com/posts/handel-lotario-145844033?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link) *Lotario* was composed in **1729–1730** and occupies a pivotal position in **Handel’s London operatic career**. It was written immediately after the…

# **Handel - Arminio - Laurence Cummings ** [https://www.patreon.com/posts/handel-arminio-145843802?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link](https://www.patreon.com/posts/handel-arminio-145843802?utm_medium=clipboard_copy&utm_source=copyLink&utm_campaign=postshare_creator&utm_content=join_link) *Arminio* was composed in **1736–1737**, during one of the most difficult and unstable phases of **Handel’s London career**. Italian opera was rapidly losing its dominant…

# **Where Haydn Was More Genius Than Mozart — A Clear, Honest Comparison** The question is delicate, but entirely legitimate. Mozart is often — and rightly — regarded as the absolute musical genius. Yet…

Rosa Ponselle — Monumental Authority Rosa Ponselle represents Norma as classical grandeur. Her voice—dark, massive, and sovereign—creates a Norma of overwhelming authority. She sounds born to command druids and armies. While less psychologically fractured…

# **THE DEATH OF GIACOMO PUCCINI — A COMPLETE ANALYSIS** *Cancer, suffering, stubborn hope, desperation, and the unfinished ending of a genius* Giacomo Puccini’s death on **29 November 1924** in Brussels stands as one…

# **SIR DONALD FRANCIS TOVEY — A LIFE** ## **I. Origins, Childhood, and the Early Emergence of a Musical Mind** Donald Francis Tovey was born on **July 17, 1875**, in Eton, into an intellectually…

# **HENRY CHARLES LITOLFF — A LIFE** ## **I. Origins, Childhood, and Early Musical Awakening** Henry Charles Litolff was born in London on **August 7, 1818**, the son of a Scottish mother, Sophie Hayes,…

# **Leopold Kupelwieser (1796–1862): A Life** Leopold Kupelwieser was born on October 17, 1796, in Markt Piesting, a quiet Lower Austrian town surrounded by hills and forests. His father, a respected court official, instilled…

# **Schubert’s Friend: Eduard von Bauernfeld (1802–1890) — The Ironically Affectionate Comrade** Eduard von Bauernfeld entered Schubert’s world in the early 1820s, at the very moment when Vienna’s artistic life was turning inward, more…

# **Richard Wagner’s Final Year — A Narrative Psychological Portrait** In the last year of his life, Richard Wagner moved through the world like a man walking inside a storm of his own making.…

# **CHOPIN – A LIFE (1810-1849)** # **Childhood in Żelazowa Wola and Warsaw (1810–1820)** ## **Early Life and Family Circle** Frédéric François Chopin was born on **1 March 1810** in the small Polish village…

# **KLAUS TENNSTEDT – 30 ANECDOTES & CURIOSITIES** **1. The Quiet Boy Who Heard Everything** As a child in Merseburg, Tennstedt was so shy that teachers feared he lacked confidence. Yet at home he…

Year 1895. Letter by Richard Strauss (1864-1949) to Gustav Mahler (1860-1911) ‘Lieber Freund’. Explaining that he cannot help him over Guntram, since Munich has behaved so badly over the opera, that he feels he…

On October 13, 1887, Mahler and Richard Strauss met On October 13, 1887, Richard Strauss presented his Second Symphony in Leipzig, and through Max Steinitzer (1864-1936), Strauss met Mahler, who was then the second…

Regarding Schubert, July 13, 1900 Mahler said: "Today I have reread all of Schubert's chamber music. Out of twelve works, there will be a maximum of four of good level. And among eight hundred…