The incomparable Jessye Mae Norman was born on 15 September 1945 into the segregated American South. As she wrote in her memoirs, “I am the joy and pride of my maternal grandmother, looking out over a front yard overflowing with

Commissioned by the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) for the clarinetist Richard Stoltzman and the BBC Welsh Symphony Orchestra, Fantasma/Cantos for clarinet and orchestra first sounded on 14 September 1991 in Cardiff. In this composition, Takemitsu imagined the orchestra as a

An eminent scholar writes, “Clara Schumann was the creative partner of three men: Friedrich Wieck, Robert Schumann, and Johannes Brahms. Her father was her sole teacher, much maligned for the role he later played in the romance between his daughter

On 12 September 1910, audiences in Munich were treated to a unique classical music extravaganza. For the premiere of his 8th Symphony, Gustav Mahler had assembled a performing cast that stretched the resources to their limits. It involved 858 singers,

Arvo Pärt was born on 11 September 1935 in Paide, in Järva County, Estonia, as the only child of Linda Anette and August Pärt. Raised by his mother and stepfather, the family moved to Rakvere, where he studied at Rakvere

Since all of Antonín Dvořák’s predecessors were butchers or innkeepers, it was automatically assumed that he would inherit the business. However, in addition to the butcher’s trade the Dvořák family also cultivated another talent, namely, a flair for music. However,

The Romanian soprano Angela Gheorghiu, born on 7 September 1965 in the small town of Adjud, certainly isn’t afraid to speak out. “I hate directors who want to express their own fantasies, forgetting about the characters. What they put on

Although Ralph Vaughan Williams was an avowed atheist, he greatly bemoaned the state of church music in England. As he writes, “It ought no longer to be true anywhere that the most exalted moments of a church-goer’s week are associated