1.
Charles Dickens
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Charles John Huffam Dickens was an English writer and social critic. He created some of the worlds best-known fictional characters and is regarded by many as the greatest novelist of the Victorian era and his works enjoyed unprecedented popularity during his lifetime, and by the twentieth century critics and scholars had recognised him as a literary genius. His novels and short stories enjoy lasting popularity, born in Portsmouth, Dickens left school to work in a factory when his father was incarcerated in a debtors prison. Dickenss literary success began with the 1836 serial publication of The Pickwick Papers, within a few years he had become an international literary celebrity, famous for his humour, satire, and keen observation of character and society. His novels, most published in monthly or weekly instalments, pioneered the publication of narrative fiction. The instalment format allowed Dickens to evaluate his audiences reaction, and he modified his plot. For example, when his wifes chiropodist expressed distress at the way Miss Mowcher in David Copperfield seemed to reflect her disabilities and his plots were carefully constructed, and he often wove elements from topical events into his narratives. Masses of the poor chipped in hapennies to have each new monthly episode read to them, opening up. Dickens was regarded as the literary colossus of his age and his 1843 novella, A Christmas Carol, remains popular and continues to inspire adaptations in every artistic genre. Oliver Twist and Great Expectations are also adapted, and, like many of his novels. His 1859 novel, A Tale of Two Cities, set in London, Dickens has been praised by fellow writers—from Leo Tolstoy to George Orwell and G. K. Chesterton—for his realism, comedy, prose style, unique characterisations, and social criticism. On the other hand, Oscar Wilde, Henry James, and Virginia Woolf complained of a lack of depth, loose writing. The term Dickensian is used to something that is reminiscent of Dickens and his writings. Charles John Huffam Dickens was born on 7 February 1812, at 1 Mile End Terrace, Landport in Portsea Island and his father was a clerk in the Navy Pay Office and was temporarily stationed in the district. He asked Christopher Huffam, rigger to His Majestys Navy, gentleman, Huffam is thought to be the inspiration for Paul Dombey, the owner of a shipping company in Dickenss eponymous Dombey and Son. In January 1815 John Dickens was called back to London, when Charles was four, they relocated to Sheerness, and thence to Chatham, Kent, where he spent his formative years until the age of 11. His early life seems to have been idyllic, though he himself a very small. Charles spent time outdoors but also read voraciously, including the novels of Tobias Smollett and Henry Fielding, as well as Robinson Crusoe
2.
Steinway & Sons
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Steinway & Sons, also known as Steinway, is an American-German piano company, founded in 1853 in Manhattan, New York City, by German immigrant Heinrich Engelhard Steinweg. The companys growth led to the opening of a factory in Queens, New York City, the factory in Queens supplies the Americas and the factory in Hamburg supplies the rest of the world. Bechstein, Bösendorfer and Blüthner, Steinway & Sons is referred to as one of the Big Four piano manufacturers, Steinway has been described as the preeminent piano company, known for making pianos of high quality and for inventions within the area of piano development. Steinway has been granted 126 patents in piano making, the first in 1857, the companys share of the high-end grand piano market consistently exceeds 80 percent. Steinway pianos have received numerous awards, one of the first is a gold medal in 1855 at the American Institute Fair at the New York Crystal Palace. From 1855 to 1862, Steinway pianos received 35 gold medals, several awards and recognitions followed, including 3 medals at the International Exposition of 1867 in Paris. The European part of the company holds a royal warrant of appointment to Queen Elizabeth II, Steinway pianos are made at the factories in Hamburg and Queens. In addition to the flagship Steinway piano line, Steinway markets two less expensive brands of piano sold under the brand names Boston and Essex. The Boston brand is for the market and the Essex brand is for the entry-level market. Heinrich Engelhard Steinweg first made pianos in the 1820s from his house in Seesen and he made pianos under the Steinweg brand until he emigrated from Germany to America in 1850 with his wife and eight of his nine children. The eldest son, C. F. Theodor Steinweg, remained in Germany, and continued making the Steinweg brand of pianos, partnering with Friedrich Grotrian, in 1853, Heinrich Engelhard Steinweg founded Steinway & Sons. His first workshop in America was in a loft at the back of 85 Varick Street in the Manhattan district of New York City. The first piano made by Steinway & Sons was given the number 483 because Heinrich Engelhard Steinweg had built 482 pianos in Germany, a year later, demand was such that the company moved to larger premises at 82–88 Walker Street. It was not until 1864 that the family anglicized their name from Steinweg to Steinway, by the 1860s, Steinway had built a new factory at Park Avenue between 52nd and 53rd Street where it covered a whole block. With a workforce of 350 men, production increased from 500 to nearly 1,800 pianos per year, the employees were mostly German immigrants and the official language of the company was German. Almost half of the companys 126 patented inventions were developed by the first, Steinways pianos won prizes at exhibitions in New York City, London, and Paris. By 1862, Steinway pianos had received more than 35 medals, part of Steinways early reputation arose from its successes in trade fairs. In 1865, the Steinway family sent a letter to C. F, C. F. Theodor Steinweg obeyed, selling his share of the German piano company to his partner, Wilhelm Grotrian, and two other workmen, Adolph Helfferich and H. G. W
3.
Fifth Avenue
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Fifth Avenue is a major thoroughfare going through the borough of Manhattan in New York City, United States. It stretches from West 143rd Street in Harlem to Washington Square North at Washington Square Park in Greenwich Village and it is considered among the most expensive and best shopping streets in the world. The lower stretch of Fifth Avenue extended the stylish neighborhood of Washington Square northwards, Fifth Avenue is the central scene in Edith Whartons 1920 Pulitzer Prize winning novel The Age of Innocence. The novel describes New Yorks social elite in the 1870s and provides context to Fifth Avenue. Originally a narrower thoroughfare, much of Fifth Avenue south of Central Park was widened in 1908, the midtown blocks, now famously commercial, were largely a residential district until the start of the 20th century. In 1906 his department store, B. Altman and Company, the result was the creation of a high-end shopping district that attracted fashionable women and the upscale stores that wished to serve them. Lord & Taylors flagship store is located on Fifth Avenue near the Empire State Building. In the 1920s traffic towers controlled important intersections from 14th to 59th Streets, traffic crosses the river on the Madison Avenue Bridge. Fifth Avenue serves as the line for house numbering and west-east streets in Manhattan. It separates, for example, East 59th Street from West 59th Street, the most expensive street in the world moniker changes depending on currency fluctuations and local economic conditions from year to year. For several years starting in the mid-1990s, the district between 49th and 57th Streets was ranked as having the worlds most expensive retail spaces on a cost per square foot basis. In 2008, Forbes magazine ranked Fifth Avenue as being the most expensive street in the world, some of the most coveted real estate on Fifth Avenue are the penthouses perched atop the buildings. The American Planning Association compiled a list of 2012 Great Places in America and this historic street has many world-renowned museums, businesses and stores, parks, luxury apartments, and historical landmarks that are reminiscent of its history and vision for the future. Below is a list of sites on Fifth Avenue with their designation dates,500 Fifth Avenue Building – December 14,2010 Aeolian Building – – December 10,2002 George W. It recognizes structures, buildings, sites, and districts associated with important events, people, Fifth Avenue from 142nd Street to 135th Street carries two-way traffic. Fifth Avenue carries one-way traffic southbound from 135th Street to Washington Square North, the changeover to one-way traffic south of 135th Street took place on January 14,1966, at which time Madison Avenue was changed to one way uptown. From 124th Street to 120th Street, Fifth Avenue is cut off by Marcus Garvey Park, Fifth Avenue is one of the few major streets in Manhattan along which streetcars did not operate. Instead, Fifth Avenue Coach offered a more to the taste of fashionable gentlefolk
4.
Manhattan
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Manhattan is the most densely populated borough of New York City, its economic and administrative center, and the citys historical birthplace. The borough is coextensive with New York County, founded on November 1,1683, Manhattan is often described as the cultural and financial capital of the world and hosts the United Nations Headquarters. Many multinational media conglomerates are based in the borough and it is historically documented to have been purchased by Dutch colonists from Native Americans in 1626 for 60 guilders which equals US$1062 today. New York County is the United States second-smallest county by land area, on business days, the influx of commuters increases that number to over 3.9 million, or more than 170,000 people per square mile. Manhattan has the third-largest population of New York Citys five boroughs, after Brooklyn and Queens, the City of New York was founded at the southern tip of Manhattan, and the borough houses New York City Hall, the seat of the citys government. The name Manhattan derives from the word Manna-hata, as written in the 1609 logbook of Robert Juet, a 1610 map depicts the name as Manna-hata, twice, on both the west and east sides of the Mauritius River. The word Manhattan has been translated as island of hills from the Lenape language. The United States Postal Service prefers that mail addressed to Manhattan use New York, NY rather than Manhattan, the area that is now Manhattan was long inhabited by the Lenape Native Americans. In 1524, Florentine explorer Giovanni da Verrazzano – sailing in service of King Francis I of France – was the first European to visit the area that would become New York City. It was not until the voyage of Henry Hudson, an Englishman who worked for the Dutch East India Company, a permanent European presence in New Netherland began in 1624 with the founding of a Dutch fur trading settlement on Governors Island. In 1625, construction was started on the citadel of Fort Amsterdam on Manhattan Island, later called New Amsterdam, the 1625 establishment of Fort Amsterdam at the southern tip of Manhattan Island is recognized as the birth of New York City. In 1846, New York historian John Romeyn Brodhead converted the figure of Fl 60 to US$23, variable-rate myth being a contradiction in terms, the purchase price remains forever frozen at twenty-four dollars, as Edwin G. Burrows and Mike Wallace remarked in their history of New York. Sixty guilders in 1626 was valued at approximately $1,000 in 2006, based on the price of silver, Straight Dope author Cecil Adams calculated an equivalent of $72 in 1992. In 1647, Peter Stuyvesant was appointed as the last Dutch Director General of the colony, New Amsterdam was formally incorporated as a city on February 2,1653. In 1664, the English conquered New Netherland and renamed it New York after the English Duke of York and Albany, the Dutch Republic regained it in August 1673 with a fleet of 21 ships, renaming the city New Orange. Manhattan was at the heart of the New York Campaign, a series of battles in the early American Revolutionary War. The Continental Army was forced to abandon Manhattan after the Battle of Fort Washington on November 16,1776. The city, greatly damaged by the Great Fire of New York during the campaign, became the British political, British occupation lasted until November 25,1783, when George Washington returned to Manhattan, as the last British forces left the city
5.
Gas lighting
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Gas lighting is production of artificial light from combustion of a gaseous fuel, such as hydrogen, methane, carbon monoxide, propane, butane, acetylene, ethylene, or natural gas. Before electricity became widespread and economical to allow for general public use, gas was the most popular method of outdoor and indoor lighting in cities. Early gas lights were ignited manually, but many designs are self-igniting. In addition, some urban historical districts retain gas street lighting, early lighting fuels consisted of olive oil, beeswax, fish oil, whale oil, sesame oil, nut oil, and similar substances. These were the most commonly used fuels until the late 18th century, chinese records dating back 1,700 years note the use of natural gas in the home for light and heat via bamboo pipes to the dwellings. Public illumination preceded the discovery and adoption of gaslight by centuries, in 1417, Sir Henry Barton, Mayor of London, ordained lanterns with lights to be hung out on the winter evenings between Hallowtide and Candlemasse. Paris was first lit by an order issued in 1524, and, in the beginning of the 16th century, in coal mining, accumulating and escaping gases were known originally for their adverse effects rather than their useful qualities. Coal miners described two types of gases, one called the choke damp and the fire damp. In 1667, a paper detailing the effects of gases was entitled, A Description of a Well and Earth in Lancashire taking Fire. Imparted by Thomas Shirley, Esq an eye-witness, stephen Hales was the first person who procured a flammable fluid from the actual distillation of coal. His experiments with this object are related in the first volume of his Vegetable Statics and these results seemed to have passed without notice for several years. This paper contained some striking facts relating to the flammability and other properties of coal-gas, the principal properties of coal-gas were demonstrated to different members of the Royal Society, and showed that after keeping the gas some time, it still retained its flammability. The scientists of the time still saw no purpose for it. John Clayton, in an extract from a letter in the Philosophical Transactions for 1735, calls gas the spirit of coal and this spirit happened to catch fire, by coming in contact with a candle as it escaped from a fracture in one of his distillatory vessels. By preserving the gas in bladders, he entertained his friends, william Murdoch was the first to exploit the flammability of gas for the practical application of lighting. He worked for Matthew Boulton and James Watt at their Soho Foundry steam engine works in Birmingham and he first lit his own house in Redruth, Cornwall in 1792. In 1798, he used gas to light the building of the Soho Foundry and in 1802 lit the outside in a public display of gas lighting. One of the employees at the Soho Foundry, Samuel Clegg, Clegg left his job to set up his own gas lighting business, the Gas Lighting and Coke Company
6.
New York Philharmonic
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It is one of the leading American orchestras popularly referred to as the Big Five. The Philharmonics home is David Geffen Hall, known as Avery Fisher Hall until September 2015, founded in 1842, the orchestra is one of the oldest musical institutions in the United States and the oldest of the Big Five orchestras. Its record-setting 14, 000th concert was given in December 2004, the New York Philharmonic was founded in 1842 by the American conductor Ureli Corelli Hill, with the aid of the Irish composer William Vincent Wallace. The orchestra was called the Philharmonic Society of New York. It was the third Philharmonic on American soil since 1799, and had as its intended purpose, the first concert of the Philharmonic Society took place on December 7,1842 in the Apollo Rooms on lower Broadway before an audience of 600. The concert opened with Beethovens Symphony No, the musicians operated as a cooperative society, deciding by a majority vote such issues as who would become a member, which music would be performed and who among them would conduct. At the end of the season, the players would divide any proceeds among themselves, after only a dozen public performances and barely four years old, the Philharmonic organized a concert to raise funds to build a new music hall. The centerpiece was the American premiere of Beethovens Symphony No,9, to take place at Castle Garden on the southern tip of Manhattan. About 400 instrumental and vocal performers gathered for this premiere, which was conducted by George Loder, the chorals were translated into what would be the first English performance anywhere in the world. However, with the expensive US$2.00 ticket price and a war rally uptown, the audience was kept away. Although judged by some as an odd work with all those singers kept at bay until the end, during the Philharmonics first seven seasons, seven musicians alternated the conducting duties. In addition to Hill, Timm and Étienne, these were William Alpers, George Loder, Louis Wiegers and this changed in 1849 when Theodore Eisfeld was installed as sole conductor for the season. Eisfeld, later along with Carl Bergmann, would be the conductor until 1865 and that year Eisfeld returned to Europe, and Bergmann continued to conduct the Society until his death in 1876. Leopold Damrosch, Franz Liszts former concertmaster at Weimar, served as conductor of the Philharmonic for the 1876/77 season, but failing to win support from the Philharmonics public, he left to create the rival Symphony Society of New York in 1878. Upon his death in 1885, his 23-year-old son Walter took over, Carnegie Hall would remain the orchestras home until 1962. The Philharmonic in 1877 was in financial condition, caused by the paltry income from five concerts in the 1876/77 season that brought in an average of only $168 per concert. At first the Philharmonics suggestion offended Thomas because he was unwilling to disband his own orchestra, because of the desperate financial circumstances, the Philharmonic offered Theodore Thomas the conductorship without conditions, and he began conducting the orchestra in the autumn of 1877. He left in 1891 to found the Chicago Symphony, taking thirteen Philharmonic musicians with him, another celebrated conductor, Anton Seidl, followed Thomas on the Philharmonic podium, serving until 1898
7.
Carnegie Hall
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Designed by architect William Burnet Tuthill and built by philanthropist Andrew Carnegie in 1891, it is one of the most prestigious venues in the world for both classical music and popular music. Carnegie Hall has its own programming, development, and marketing departments. It is also rented out to performing groups, the hall has not had a resident company since 1962, when the New York Philharmonic moved to Lincoln Centers Philharmonic Hall. Carnegie Hall has 3,671 seats, divided among its three auditoriums, Carnegie Hall presented about 200 concerts in the 2008–2009 season, up 3 percent from the previous year. Its stages were rented for an additional 600 events in the 2008–2009 season, Carnegie Hall contains three distinct, separate performance spaces. The Isaac Stern Auditorium seats 2,804 on five levels and was named after violinist Isaac Stern in 1997 to recognize his efforts to save the hall from demolition in the 1960s, the hall is enormously high, and visitors to the top balcony must climb 137 steps. All but the top level can be reached by elevator, the main hall was home to the performances of the New York Philharmonic from 1892 until 1962. Known as the most prestigious concert stage in the U. S. almost all of the classical music. After years of wear and tear, the hall was extensively renovated in 1986. The Ronald O. Perelman Stage is 42 feet deep, the First Tier and Second Tier consist of sixty-five boxes, the First Tier has 264 seats at eight seats per box and the Second Tier seats 238, with boxes ranging from six to eight seats each. Second from the top is the Dress Circle, seating 444 in six rows, at the top, the balcony seats 837. Although seats with obstructed views exist throughout the auditorium, only the Dress Circle level has structural columns, Zankel Hall, which seats 599, is named after Judy and Arthur Zankel. Originally called simply Recital Hall, this was the first auditorium to open to the public in April 1891, following renovations made in 1896, it was renamed Carnegie Lyceum. The completely reconstructed Zankel Hall is flexible in design and can be reconfigured in several different arrangements to suit the needs of the performers, the 599 seats in Zankel Hall are arranged in two levels. The Parterre level seats a total of 463 and the Mezzanine level seats 136, each level has a number of seats which are situated along the side walls, perpendicular to the stage. These seats are designated as boxes, there are 54 seats in six boxes on the Parterre level and 48 seats in four boxes on the Mezzanine level, the boxes on the Parterre level are raised above the level of the stage. Zankel Hall is accessible and its stage is 44 feet wide and 25 feet deep — the stage occupies approximately one fifth of the performance space, the Joan and Sanford I. Weill Recital Hall seats 268 and is named after Sanford I. Weill, a chairman of the board, and his wife Joan
8.
Anton Rubinstein
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He was the elder brother of Nikolai Rubinstein who founded the Moscow Conservatory. As a pianist, Rubinstein ranks amongst the great 19th-century keyboard virtuosos and he became most famous for his series of historical recitals—seven enormous, consecutive concerts covering the history of piano music. Rubinstein played this series throughout Russia and Eastern Europe and in the United States when he toured there, although best remembered as a pianist and educator, Rubinstein was also a prolific composer throughout much of his life. He wrote 20 operas, the best known of which is The Demon and he also composed a large number of other works, including five piano concertos, six symphonies and a large number of solo piano works along with a substantial output of works for chamber ensemble. Rubinstein was born to Jewish parents in the village of Vikhvatinets in the district of Podolsk, Russia, on the Dniestr River, before he was 5 years old, his paternal grandfather ordered all members of the Rubinstein family to convert from Judaism to Russian Orthodoxy. Although he was raised as a Christian, Rubinstein would later return to being atheist, Rubinsteins father opened a pencil factory in Moscow. His mother, a competent musician, began giving him lessons at five, until the teacher Alexander Villoing heard. Rubinstein made his first public appearance at a charity concert at the age of nine. Later that year Rubinsteins mother sent him, accompanied by Villoing, Rubinstein and Villoing remained in Paris for a year. In December 1840, Rubinstein played in the Salle Érard for an audience that included Frédéric Chopin, Chopin invited Rubinstein to his studio and played for him. Liszt advised Villoing to take him to Germany to study composition, however, Villoing took Rubinstein on a concert tour of Europe. They finally returned to Moscow in June 1843, Anton was 14 years old, Nikolai was eight. In spring 1844, Rubinstein, Nikolai, his mother and his sister Luba travelled to Berlin, here he met with, and was supported by, Felix Mendelssohn and Giacomo Meyerbeer. Mendelssohn, who had heard Rubinstein when he had toured with Villoing, said he needed no further piano study, Meyerbeer directed both boys to Siegfried Dehn for work in composition and theory. Word came in the summer of 1846 that Rubinsteins father was gravely ill, Rubinstein was left in Berlin while his mother, sister and brother returned to Russia. At first he continued his studies with Dehn, then with Adolf Bernhard Marx, Now 17, he knew he could no longer pass as a child prodigy. He sought out Liszt in Vienna, hoping Liszt would accept him as a pupil, however, after Rubinstein had played his audition, Liszt is reported to have said, A talented man must win the goal of his ambition by his own unassisted efforts. At this point, Rubinstein was living in acute poverty, Liszt did nothing to help him
9.
Walter Damrosch
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Walter Johannes Damrosch was a German-born American conductor and composer. Damrosch was born in Breslau, Silesia, a son of Helene von Heimburg, an opera singer, and the conductor Leopold Damrosch. He exhibited an interest in music at an age and was instructed by his father in harmony and also studied under Wilhelm Albert Rischbieter. He emigrated with his parents in 1871 to the United States. During the great music festival given by his father in May 1881, he first acted as conductor in drilling several sections of the chorus, one in New York City. The latter, consisting chiefly of members of the Harmonic Society, during this time a series of concerts was given in which such works as Anton Rubinsteins Tower of Babel, Hector Berliozs La damnation de Faust, and Giuseppe Verdis Requiem were performed. He was then only 19 years of age, but showed marked ability in drilling large masses, in 1884, when his father initiated a run of all-German opera at the Metropolitan Opera in New York, Walter was made an assistant conductor. After his fathers death in 1885, he held the same post under Anton Seidl and also conductor of the Oratorio. On May 17,1890, he married Margaret Blaine, the daughter of American politician and he conducted famed solo harpist Vincent Fanelli from 1908 to 1911. At the request of General Pershing he reorganized the bands of the A. E. F. in 1918, carl Goldmarks opera Merlin was produced for the first time in the United States under Damroschs direction, at the Metropolitan Opera House,3 January 1887. Although now remembered almost exclusively as a conductor, before his radio broadcasts Damrosch was equally known as a composer. He composed operas based on such as The Scarlet Letter, Cyrano. Those operas are very seldom performed now and his Wagner recordings are still widely available. He also composed songs such as the intensely dramatic Danny Deever, according to former New York Times critic Harold C. An example, for the first movement of Franz Schuberts Unfinished Symphony, although Damrosch took an interest in music technologies, he recorded sporadically. His first recording, the prelude to Bizets Carmen, appeared in 1903. C. for RCA Victor in the early 1930s, Walter Damrosch died in New York City in 1950. Damrosch Park at Lincoln Center is named in honor of his family, the public school P186X Walter J. Damrosch School in the Bronx is named after him. A collection of photographs and other items compiled by his daughter Anita is among the Special Collections of the Lovejoy Library at Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, Damrosch is often remembered today as the target of Theodore Wiesengrund Adornos criticism
10.
Jenny Lind
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Johanna Maria Lind, better known as Jenny Lind, was a Swedish opera singer, often known as the Swedish Nightingale. She was a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Music from 1840, Lind became famous after her performance in Der Freischütz in Sweden in 1838. Within a few years, she had suffered damage. She was in demand in opera roles throughout Sweden and northern Europe during the 1840s. After two acclaimed seasons in London, she announced her retirement from opera at the age of 29, in 1850, Lind went to America at the invitation of the showman P. T. Barnum. She gave 93 large-scale concerts for him and then continued to tour under her own management and she earned more than $350,000 from these concerts, donating the proceeds to charities, principally the endowment of free schools in Sweden. With her new husband, Otto Goldschmidt, she returned to Europe in 1852 where she had three children and gave occasional concerts over the two decades, settling in England in 1855. From 1882, for years, she was a professor of singing at the Royal College of Music in London. Born in Klara, in central Stockholm, Lind was the daughter of Niclas Jonas Lind, a bookkeeper, and Anne-Marie Fellborg. Linds mother had divorced her first husband for adultery but, for religious reasons, Linds parents married when she was fourteen. Linds mother ran a day school for girls out of her home, when Lind was about nine years old, her singing was overheard by the maid of Mademoiselle Lundberg, the principal dancer at the Royal Swedish Opera. Lind began to sing onstage when she was ten and she had a vocal crisis at the age of 12 and had to stop singing for a time, but recovered. Her first great role was Agathe in Webers Der Freischütz in 1838 at the Royal Swedish Opera, at age 20 she was a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Music and court singer to the King of Sweden and Norway. Her voice became seriously damaged by overuse and untrained singing technique, so damaged was her voice that he insisted that she should not sing at all for three months, to allow her vocal cords to recover, before he started to teach her a secure vocal technique. After Lind had been with García for a year, the composer Giacomo Meyerbeer, an early and faithful admirer of her talent, arranged an audition for her at the Opéra in Paris, but she was rejected. The biographer Francis Rogers concludes that Lind strongly resented the rebuff, Lind returned to the Royal Swedish Opera, greatly improved as a singer by Garcías training. She toured Denmark where, in 1843, Hans Christian Andersen met, although the two became good friends, she did not reciprocate his romantic feelings. She is believed to have inspired three of his tales, Beneath the Pillar, The Angel and The Nightingale
11.
Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky
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He was the first Russian composer whose music made a lasting impression internationally, bolstered by his appearances as a guest conductor in Europe and the United States. Tchaikovsky was honored in 1884, by Emperor Alexander III, although musically precocious, Tchaikovsky was educated for a career as a civil servant. There was scant opportunity for a career in Russia at that time. When an opportunity for such an education arose, he entered the nascent Saint Petersburg Conservatory, Tchaikovskys training set him on a path to reconcile what he had learned with the native musical practices to which he had been exposed from childhood. From this reconciliation, he forged a personal but unmistakably Russian style—a task that did not prove easy, Russian culture exhibited a split personality, with its native and adopted elements having drifted apart increasingly since the time of Peter the Great. This resulted in uncertainty among the intelligentsia about the countrys national identity—an ambiguity mirrored in Tchaikovskys career, despite his many popular successes, Tchaikovskys life was punctuated by personal crises and depression. His homosexuality, which he kept private, has also been considered a major factor. Tchaikovskys sudden death at the age of 53 is generally ascribed to cholera, there is a debate as to whether cholera was indeed the cause of death. While his music has remained popular among audiences, critical opinions were initially mixed, some Russians did not feel it was sufficiently representative of native musical values and expressed suspicion that Europeans accepted the music for its Western elements. Others dismissed Tchaikovskys music as lacking in elevated thought, according to longtime New York Times music critic Harold C, schonberg, and derided its formal workings as deficient because they did not stringently follow Western principles. Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky was born in Votkinsk, a town in Vyatka Governorate in the Russian Empire. His father, Ilya Petrovich Tchaikovsky, had served as a lieutenant colonel and engineer in the Department of Mines and his grandfather, Pyotr Fedorovich Tchaikovsky, served first as a physicians assistant in the army and later as city governor of Glazov in Viatka. His great-grandfather, a Ukrainian Cossack named Fyodor Chaika, distinguished himself under Peter the Great at the Battle of Poltava in 1709, Tchaikovskys mother, Alexandra Andreyevna, was the second of Ilyas three wives,18 years her husbands junior and French on her fathers side. Both Ilya and Alexandra were trained in the arts, including music—a necessity as a posting to an area of Russia also meant a need for entertainment. Of Tchaikovskys six siblings, he was close to his sister Alexandra and twin brothers Anatoly, alexandras marriage to Lev Davydov would produce seven children and lend Tchaikovsky the only real family life he would know as an adult, especially during his years of wandering. One of those children, Vladimir Davydov, whom the composer would nickname Bob, in 1844, the family hired Fanny Dürbach, a 22-year-old French governess. Four-and-a-half-year-old Tchaikovsky was initially too young to study alongside his older brother Nikolai. By the age of six, he had become fluent in French, Dürbach saved much of Tchaikovskys work from this period, which includes his earliest known compositions, and became a source of several childhood anecdotes
12.
Rotunda (architecture)
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A rotunda is any building with a circular ground plan, and sometimes covered by a dome. It can also refer to a room within a building. The Pantheon in Rome is a famous rotunda, a Band Rotunda is a circular bandstand, usually with a dome. The rotunda has historical and architectural value because it was widespread in medieval Central Europe, a great number of parochial churches were built in this form in the 9th to 11th centuries BCE in Central Europe. This type of circular shaped parochial building can be found in great number in Hungary, Poland, Slovakia, Croatia, Austria, Bavaria, Dalmatia, Germany, and it was thought of as a structure descending from the Roman Pantheon. However, it can be found mainly not on former Roman territories, generally its size was 6–9 meters inner diameter and the apsis was directed toward the east. Sometimes 3 or 4 apsides were glued to the central circle, several types of rotundas are found in the Carpathian Basin, within the former boundaries of Medieval Hungary. The role and form developed from gradual enlargements of ancient small village churches, many of them still stand today, e. g. in Nagytótlak, Kallósd and Kissikátor in Hungary or in Bíňa and Šivetice in Slovakia. In many places the ancient foundations have been excavated and conserved, the village church of Sárospatak is complete with a simple circular nave and an eastern apse. The church of Alagimajor at Dunakeszi was enlarged toward the apse in the 14th century, in many cases the rotunda was used as the apse of the villages new and larger church. Such semi-circle apses are preserved all over the Carpathian Basin, rotundas of six apses, a most interesting form, are found at Karcsa, Kiszombor in Hungary, at Horjany in Ukraine and several places in Armenia. There is a connection between Central European and Caucasian rotundas of the 9th to 11th centuries BCE. Several Armenian built rotunda churches have sixfold arched central apsis, i. e. at Aragatz, Bagaran, Bagnayr, Botshor, at the same time eightfold arched central buildings are also frequently occurring in Armenia, Ani, Irind, Varzhahan. It was a suggestion that there was not only western European, temple of Heaven construction completed on 1420 during Yongle Emperor who also constructed Forbidden City of China. Fujian Tulou is a traditional rural dwellings of the Hakka in Fujian region of China and they are built between the 12th and the 20th centuries. The Baptistery at the Piazza dei Miracoli, Pisa, Italy, the Church of the Rotonda in Thessaloniki, built as the Tomb of Galerius in 306 AD. The St George Rotunda in Sofia, Bulgaria, a 4th-century Early Christian church, St. George Cathedral Church at Zvartnots, Armenia. St. Martins Rotunda in Vyšehrad Castle, Prague, Czech Republic, the Rotunda of St Marija Assunta in Mosta, Malta
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