The “Grande Symphonie funèbre et triomphale,” to use its full title, was Hector Berlioz’s fourth and last symphony. Commissioned by the Minister of the Interior for the commemoration of the 10th anniversary of the three-day revolution of July 1830, the

Whether we’re a student musician, or an amateur or professional musician, we are passionate about our music-making—Brahms, Beethoven, Chopin, Stravinsky? Bring it on…I’ll just practice more! Want it faster and louder? Sure… But wait. This attitude has caused many a

Hoping to gain financial independence, Richard Wagner was eager to establish an annual music festival that would realize his particular vision of music and theatre. Initially he contemplated Munich, but his extravagant and scandalous behavior in that city caused him

The other day I was looking through the earliest articles written for my blog. Some of my early writing is horribly self-conscious, and evidently written with little expectation of anyone actually reading it. But however much this “juvenilia” may make

24 July 1983 marked the 200th birthday of Simón Bolívar, known around South America as “El Libertador.” The Venezuelan military and political leader played a significant role in the establishment of Venezuela, Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, and Panama as sovereign

We’ve all heard of musical chairs, a game of elimination involving players, chairs, and music. With one fewer chair than players, when the music stops the player who fails to sit on a chair is eliminated. A chair is then

On 22 July 1864 Clara Schumann and conductor Hermann Levi played through a piano sonata for two pianos by Johannes Brahms. Clara was overwhelmed by the music’s grandeur, and wrote to the composer. “The work is splendid, but it cannot

If I had a pound for every time a student said this in a lesson, I’d be a rich woman by now! We’ve all heard it, and I know I’ve been guilty of saying it myself occasionally at piano lessons