1.
1883 in art
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20 April – Claude Monet moves to the house in Giverny which will be his main residence for the rest of his life. 28 October – Les XX established in Brussels by Octave Maus, L. Wyllie – Toil, Glitter, Grime and Wealth on a Flowing Tide 3 February – Camille Bombois, French naïve painter. 18 February – Jacques Ochs, French artist, épée and foil fencer,12 April Francis Cadell, Scottish Colourist painter Imogen Cunningham, American photographer. 24 June – Jean Metzinger, French painter and art theorist,16 July – Charles Sheeler, American modernist painter and photographer. 31 July – Erich Heckel, German painter and printmaker,19 August – Coco Chanel, French fashion designer. 14 September – Richard Gerstl, Austrian painter and draughtsman,9 November – Charles Demuth, American painter. 4 December – Felice Casorati, Italian painter,24 December – Stojan Aralica, famous Serbian Impressionist painter and academic. 26 December – Maurice Utrillo, French painter, date unknown – Charles Jourdan, French fashion designer
2.
Gretsch
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Gretsch is an American company that manufactures guitars, basses and drums. The company was founded in 1883 by Friedrich Gretsch, a 27-year-old German immigrant, Friedrich Gretsch manufactured banjos, tambourines, and drums until his death in 1895. In 1916, his son, Fred Gretsch Sr. moved operations to Brooklyn, most modern-era Gretsch guitars are manufactured in the Far East, though American-made Custom Shop models are available. In 2003, Gretsch entered an agreement with Fender Musical Instruments Corporation. Under the terms of that agreement Fred W. Gretsch would retain ownership while FMIC would handle most of the development, distribution, Gretsch was founded in 1883 by Friedrich Gretsch, a young German immigrant. His Brooklyn shop was designed for the manufacture of banjos, tambourines, in 1895, Gretsch died at the age of 39, and the then successful company was taken over by his son Fred Sr. By 1916, Fred had moved the company into a larger 10-story building in the Williamsburg district, chuck Berry also played the Duo Jet when he recorded his first major hit, Maybellene and is pictured on his LP After School Session. Two other models were introduced - the Country Club, and the White Falcon, Guitar production by the Gretsch Company began in the early 1930s, and Gretsch guitars became highly sought after, most notably in the 1950s and 1960s. They lost favor with players during the 1970s and 1980s for various reasons, Gretsch eventually went bankrupt, then was revived in 1989 by Fred W. Gretsch, a great-grandson of Friedrich Gretsch. Fred W. Gretsch remains president of the company, during this time, Chet Atkins became an endorser of Gretsch. Atkins was one of the pre-eminent guitarists of his day, and his endorsement gave Gretsch greater visibility in competition with Gibson and Fender. Gretsch ultimately sold thousands of guitars with Chets name on the pickguard, most notably the 6120 Chet Atkins model, the worldwide success of Eddys twangy instrumental records, television appearances, and extensive touring, helped expose the Gretsch guitar to the teenage rock and roll market. George Harrison, years later, would refer to model as the Eddie Cochran/Duane Eddy guitar. Other Chet Atkins models were the Country Gentleman and the Tennessean, many rockabilly players had followed in the footsteps of Eddie Cochran, who also wielded a 6120 and Gene Vincents guitarist Cliff Gallup, who played a Duo Jet. Elvis Presley later owned a Gretsch Country Gentleman—, playing it briefly both on stage and in the studio, Gretsch quickly became a legitimate competitor to both Gibson and its main rivals, Fender and Rickenbacker. Gretsch fortunes rose yet again in the sixties when George Harrison played a Gretsch Country Gentleman on The Ed Sullivan Show. Despite popular belief, he acquired two Country Gentleman guitars, his first was destroyed when it fell out of the trunk of a car on the roadway. He would later switch to a Gretsch Tennessean and his Country Gentleman made its last appearance in the video of Youre Going to Lose That Girl in the movie Help
3.
John Philip Sousa
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John Philip Sousa was an American composer and conductor of the late Romantic era, known primarily for American military and patriotic marches. Because of his mastery of composition, he is known as The March King. Among his best-known marches are The Stars and Stripes Forever, Semper Fidelis, The Liberty Bell, The Thunderer, Sousa began his career playing violin and studying music theory and composition under John Esputa and George Felix Benkert. His father enlisted him in the United States Marine Band as an apprentice in 1868, after departing the band in 1875, Sousa learned to conduct. From 1880 until his death, he focused exclusively on conducting and he eventually rejoined the Marine Band and served there for 12 years as director. On leaving the Marine Band, Sousa organized his own band and he toured Europe and Australia and developed the sousaphone, a large brass instrument similar to the helicon and tuba. At the outbreak of World War I, Sousa was commissioned as a lieutenant commander, following his tenure, he returned to conduct the Sousa Band until his death in 1932. In the 1920s he was promoted to lieutenant commander in the naval reserve, Sousa started his music education by playing the violin as a pupil of John Esputa and George Felix Benkert for harmony and musical composition at the age of six. He was found to have absolute pitch, during his childhood, Sousa studied voice, violin, piano, flute, cornet, baritone horn, trombone, and alto horn. When Sousa was 13, his father, a trombonist in the Marine Band, several years long after serving his apprenticeship, Sousa joined a theatrical orchestra where he learned to conduct. He returned to the U. S. Marine Band as its head in 1880, Sousa led The Presidents Own band under five presidents from Rutherford B. Hayes to Benjamin Harrison. Sousas band played at two Inaugural Balls, those of James A. Garfield in 1881, and Benjamin Harrison in 1889 and he wanted a tuba that could sound upward and over the band whether its player was seated or marching. The sousaphone was re-created in 1898 by C. G. Conn and he organized The Sousa Band the year he left the Marine Band. The Sousa Band toured from 1892 to 1931, performing at 15,623 concerts both in America and around the world, including at the World Exposition in Paris, France and at the Royal Albert Hall in London. In Paris, the Sousa Band marched through the streets to the Arc de Triomphe – one of only eight parades the band marched in over its forty years, on December 30,1879, Sousa married Jane van Middlesworth Bellis. They had three children, John Philip, Jr. Jane Priscilla, and Helen, All were buried in the John Philip Sousa plot in the Congressional Cemetery. Wife Jane, daughters Jane Priscilla and Helen Abert joined the Daughters of the American Revolution in 1907 and their ancestor was Adam Bellis, who served under several different commands for the New Jersey troops in the American Revolutionary War. Late in his life, Sousa lived in Sands Point, New York, Sousa died of heart failure at the age of 77 on March 6,1932, in his room at the Abraham Lincoln Hotel in Reading, Pennsylvania
4.
Classical music
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Classical music is art music produced or rooted in the traditions of Western music, including both liturgical and secular music. The central norms of this tradition became codified between 1550 and 1900, which is known as the common-practice period, Western staff notation is used by composers to indicate to the performer the pitches, tempo, meter and rhythms for a piece of music. This can leave less room for such as improvisation and ad libitum ornamentation. The term classical music did not appear until the early 19th century, the earliest reference to classical music recorded by the Oxford English Dictionary is from about 1836. This score typically determines details of rhythm, pitch, and, the written quality of the music has enabled a high level of complexity within them, J. S. The use of written notation also preserves a record of the works, Musical notation enables 2000s-era performers to sing a choral work from the 1300s Renaissance era or a 1700s Baroque concerto with many of the features of the music being reproduced. That said, the score does not provide complete and exact instructions on how to perform a historical work, even if the tempo is written with an Italian instruction, we do not know exactly how fast the piece should be played. Bach was particularly noted for his complex improvisations, during the Classical era, the composer-performer Mozart was noted for his ability to improvise melodies in different styles. During the Classical era, some virtuoso soloists would improvise the cadenza sections of a concerto, during the Romantic era, Beethoven would improvise at the piano. The instruments currently used in most classical music were largely invented before the mid-19th century and they consist of the instruments found in an orchestra or in a concert band, together with several other solo instruments. The symphony orchestra is the most widely known medium for music and includes members of the string, woodwind, brass. The concert band consists of members of the woodwind, brass and it generally has a larger variety and number of woodwind and brass instruments than the orchestra but does not have a string section. However, many bands use a double bass. Many of the used to perform medieval music still exist. Medieval instruments included the flute, the recorder and plucked string instruments like the lute. As well, early versions of the organ, fiddle, Medieval instruments in Europe had most commonly been used singly, often self accompanied with a drone note, or occasionally in parts. From at least as early as the 13th century through the 15th century there was a division of instruments into haut, during the earlier medieval period, the vocal music from the liturgical genre, predominantly Gregorian chant, was monophonic, using a single, unaccompanied vocal melody line. Polyphonic vocal genres, which used multiple independent vocal melodies, began to develop during the medieval era, becoming prevalent by the later 13th
5.
Johannes Brahms
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Johannes Brahms was a German composer and pianist of the Romantic period. Born in Hamburg into a Lutheran family, Brahms spent much of his life in Vienna. Brahms composed for orchestra, chamber ensembles, piano, organ. A virtuoso pianist, he premiered many of his own works and he worked with some of the leading performers of his time, including the pianist Clara Schumann and the violinist Joseph Joachim. Many of his works have become staples of the concert repertoire. An uncompromising perfectionist, Brahms destroyed some of his works and left others unpublished, Brahms has been considered, by his contemporaries and by later writers, as both a traditionalist and an innovator. His music is rooted in the structures and compositional techniques of the Classical masters. While many contemporaries found his music too academic, his contribution and craftsmanship have been admired by subsequent figures as diverse as Arnold Schoenberg, the diligent, highly constructed nature of Brahmss works was a starting point and an inspiration for a generation of composers. Embedded within his meticulous structures, however, are deeply romantic motifs, Brahmss father, Johann Jakob Brahms, was from the town of Heide in Holstein. The family name was sometimes spelt Brahmst or Brams, and derives from Bram. Against the familys will, Johann Jakob pursued a career in music, arriving in Hamburg in 1826, where he work as a jobbing musician. In 1830, he married Johanna Henrika Christiane Nissen, a seamstress 17 years older than he was, in the same year he was appointed as a horn player in the Hamburg militia. Eventually he became a player in the Hamburg Stadttheater and the Hamburg Philharmonic Society. As Johann Jakob prospered, the family moved over the years to better accommodation in Hamburg. Johannes Brahms was born in 1833, his sister Elisabeth had been born in 1831, Fritz also became a pianist, overshadowed by his brother he emigrated to Caracas in 1867, and later returned to Hamburg as a teacher. Johann Jakob gave his son his first musical training, Johannes also learnt to play the violin, from 1840 he studied piano with Otto Friedrich Willibald Cossel. Cossel complained in 1842 that Brahms could be such a good player, at the age of 10, Brahms made his debut as a performer in a private concert including Beethovens quintet for piano and winds Op.16 and a piano quartet by Mozart. He also played as a solo work an étude of Henri Herz, by 1845 he had written a piano sonata in G minor
6.
Emmanuel Chabrier
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Alexis Emmanuel Chabrier was a French Romantic composer and pianist. Although known primarily for two of his works, España and Joyeuse marche, he left an important corpus of operas, songs. He was admired by composers as diverse as Debussy, Ravel, Richard Strauss, Satie, Schmitt, Stravinsky, Chabrier was also associated with some of the leading writers and painters of his time. He was especially friendly with the painters Claude Monet and Édouard Manet, a number of such paintings from his personal collection are now housed in some of the worlds leading art museums. Alexis-Emmanuel Chabrier was born in Ambert, a town in the Auvergne region of central France and his father was an attorney, his childhood nanny Anne Delayre remained close to him throughout her life. He began his music lessons at the age of six, the earliest of his compositions to survive in manuscript are piano works from 1849, a piano piece from this period, Le Scalp. was later modified into the Marche des Cipayes. In 1856 the family made Paris their home, and the young Chabrier continued serious studies in both of his chosen fields, despite this, his passion was music, during the 1860s he composed a number of minor piano works. His enthusiasm for Wagners music began at this time, and he copied out the score of Tannhäuser. From 1862 he entered the circle of the Parnassians in Paris and his passion for poetry led to a long friendship with Paul Verlaine, who contributed librettos to two early operettas that Chabrier did not complete. The wife of Renoir, a friend of Chabrier, wrote, one day Chabrier came and it sounded as if a hurricane had been let loose. He pounded and pounded the keyboard, the street was full of people, and they were listening, fascinated. When Chabrier reached the last crashing chords, I swore to myself I would never touch the piano again Besides, Chabrier had broken several strings and put the piano out of action. Alfred Bruneau recalled that he played the piano as no one has played it before. During the Franco-Prussian War and Commune, Chabrier continued with his job as the ministry moved from Tours to Bordeaux to Versailles. In 1873, he married Marie Alice Dejean, with whom he had three sons, one of whom died in early childhood and he began several stage works during the 1870s. His first one to be completed was Létoile, which achieved 48 successful performances at the Théâtre des Bouffes Parisiens in 1877, on a trip to Munich with Henri Duparc in 1879, he discovered Wagners opera Tristan und Isolde. This event led him to realize his passion for composition. That year he composed his piano cycle Pièces pittoresques, of which the Idylle greatly influenced Francis Poulenc, Chabrier plunged himself into the scores of Wagner, and became an assistant to Charles Lamoureux in preparing concert performances of the German composers works in Paris
7.
Charles Gounod
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Charles-François Gounod was a French composer, best known for his Ave Maria, based on a work by Bach, as well as his opera Faust. Another opera by Gounod occasionally still performed is Roméo et Juliette, although he is known for his Grand Operas, the soprano aria Que ferons-nous avec le ragoût de citrouille. From his first opera Livre de recettes dun enfant is still performed in concert as an encore, Gounod died at Saint-Cloud in 1893, after a final revision of his twelve operas. His funeral took place ten days later at the Church of the Madeleine, with Camille Saint-Saëns playing the organ and Gabriel Fauré conducting. Ironically because of its obscurity today, an arrangement of Que ferons-nous avec le ragoût de citrouille. was performed by Saint-Saens at the funeral, due to its simple and it was later published as a posthumous Op.60. He was buried at the Cimetière dAuteuil in Paris, Gounod was born in Paris, the son of a pianist mother and an artist father. His mother was his first piano teacher, Gounod first showed his musical talents under her tutelage. He then entered the Paris Conservatoire, where he studied under Fromental Halévy, in 1839 he won the Prix de Rome for his cantata Fernand. In so doing he was following his father, François-Louis Gounod had won the second Prix de Rome in painting in 1783. During his stay of four years in Italy, Gounod studied the music of Palestrina and other sacred works of the sixteenth century, around 1846-47 he gave serious consideration to joining the priesthood, but he changed his mind before actually taking holy orders, and went back to composition. During that period he was attached to the Church of Foreign Missions in Paris, in 1854 Gounod completed a Messe Solennelle, also known as the St. Cecilia Mass. This work was first performed in its entirety in the church of St. Eustache in Paris on Saint Cecilias Day,22 November 1855, during 1855 Gounod wrote two symphonies. His Symphony No.1 in D major was the inspiration for the Symphony in C composed later that year by Georges Bizet, fanny Mendelssohn, sister of Felix Mendelssohn, introduced the keyboard music of Johann Sebastian Bach to Gounod, who came to revere him. For him The Well-Tempered Clavier was the law to pianoforte study. the unquestioned textbook of musical composition and it inspired Gounod to devise a melody and superimpose it on the C major Prelude from the collections first book. To this melody in 1859, Gounod fitted the words of the Ave Maria, Gounod wrote his first opera, Sapho, in 1851 at the urging of his friend, the singer Pauline Viardot, it was a commercial failure. He had no theatrical success until Faust, derived from Goethe. The romantic and melodious Roméo et Juliette, premiered in 1867, is revived now, mireille, first performed in 1864, has been admired by connoisseurs rather than by the general public. The other Gounod operas have fallen into oblivion, from 1870 to 1874 Gounod lived in England, at 17 Morden Road, Blackheath
8.
Opera
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Opera is an art form in which singers and musicians perform a dramatic work combining text and musical score, usually in a theatrical setting. In traditional opera, singers do two types of singing, recitative, a style and arias, a more melodic style. Opera incorporates many of the elements of theatre, such as acting, scenery. The performance is given in an opera house, accompanied by an orchestra or smaller musical ensemble. Opera is a key part of the Western classical music tradition, in the 18th century, Italian opera continued to dominate most of Europe, attracting foreign composers such as George Frideric Handel. Opera seria was the most prestigious form of Italian opera, until Christoph Willibald Gluck reacted against its artificiality with his operas in the 1760s. The first third of the 19th century saw the point of the bel canto style, with Gioachino Rossini, Gaetano Donizetti. It also saw the advent of Grand Opera typified by the works of Auber and Meyerbeer, the mid-to-late 19th century was a golden age of opera, led and dominated by Richard Wagner in Germany and Giuseppe Verdi in Italy. The popularity of opera continued through the era in Italy and contemporary French opera through to Giacomo Puccini. During the 19th century, parallel operatic traditions emerged in central and eastern Europe, the 20th century saw many experiments with modern styles, such as atonality and serialism, Neoclassicism, and Minimalism. With the rise of recording technology, singers such as Enrico Caruso, since the invention of radio and television, operas were also performed on these mediums. Beginning in 2006, a number of opera houses began to present live high-definition video transmissions of their performances in cinemas all over the world. In 2009, an opera company offered a download of a complete performance. The words of an opera are known as the libretto, some composers, notably Wagner, have written their own libretti, others have worked in close collaboration with their librettists, e. g. Mozart with Lorenzo Da Ponte. Vocal duets, trios and other ensembles often occur, and choruses are used to comment on the action, in some forms of opera, such as singspiel, opéra comique, operetta, and semi-opera, the recitative is mostly replaced by spoken dialogue. Melodic or semi-melodic passages occurring in the midst of, or instead of, the terminology of the various kinds of operatic voices is described in detail below. Over the 18th century, arias were accompanied by the orchestra. Subsequent composers have tended to follow Wagners example, though some, the changing role of the orchestra in opera is described in more detail below
9.
Franz Liszt
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Franz Liszt was a prolific 19th-century Hungarian composer, virtuoso pianist, conductor, music teacher, arranger, organist, philanthropist, author, nationalist and a Franciscan tertiary. Liszt gained renown in Europe during the nineteenth century for his prodigious virtuosic skill as a pianist. As a composer, Liszt was one of the most prominent representatives of the New German School and he left behind an extensive and diverse body of work in which he influenced his forward-looking contemporaries and anticipated many 20th-century ideas and trends. Franz Liszt was born to Anna Liszt and Adam Liszt on October 22,1811, in the village of Doborján in Sopron County, in the Kingdom of Hungary, Liszts father played the piano, violin, cello and guitar. He had been in the service of Prince Nikolaus II Esterházy and knew Haydn, Hummel, at age six, Franz began listening attentively to his fathers piano playing and showed an interest in both sacred and Romani music. Adam began teaching him the piano at age seven, and Franz began composing in an elementary manner when he was eight and he appeared in concerts at Sopron and Pressburg in October and November 1820 at age 9. After the concerts, a group of wealthy sponsors offered to finance Franzs musical education in Vienna, There Liszt received piano lessons from Carl Czerny, who in his own youth had been a student of Beethoven and Hummel. He also received lessons in composition from Antonio Salieri, then director of the Viennese court. Liszts public debut in Vienna on December 1,1822, at a concert at the Landständischer Saal, was a great success and he was greeted in Austrian and Hungarian aristocratic circles and also met Beethoven and Schubert. In spring 1823, when his one-year leave of absence came to an end, Adam Liszt therefore took his leave of the Princes services. At the end of April 1823, the returned to Hungary for the last time. At the end of May 1823, the family went to Vienna again, towards the end of 1823 or early 1824, Liszts first composition to be published, his Variation on a Waltz by Diabelli, appeared as Variation 24 in Part II of Vaterländischer Künstlerverein. Liszts inclusion in the Diabelli project—he was described in it as an 11 year old boy, born in Hungary—was almost certainly at the instigation of Czerny, his teacher, Liszt was the only child composer in the anthology. After his fathers death in 1827, Liszt moved to Paris, to earn money, Liszt gave lessons in piano playing and composition, often from early morning until late at night. His students were scattered across the city and he often had to long distances. Because of this, he kept uncertain hours and also took up smoking, the following year he fell in love with one of his pupils, Caroline de Saint-Cricq, the daughter of Charles Xs minister of commerce, Pierre de Saint-Cricq. Her father, however, insisted that the affair be broken off, Liszt fell very ill, to the extent that an obituary notice was printed in a Paris newspaper, and he underwent a long period of religious doubts and pessimism. He again stated a wish to join the Church but was dissuaded this time by his mother and he had many discussions with the Abbé de Lamennais, who acted as his spiritual father, and also with Chrétien Urhan, a German-born violinist who introduced him to the Saint-Simonists
