Monthly Archives: June 2021

June 30: Today’s Music History

Posted by MaryO on

today

 

Be sure your student reads and listens to Today’s Daily Listening Assignment

 

• 1666 ~ Adam Krieger, German Composer, died at the age of 32

• 1669 ~ Mauritius Vogt, Composer

• 1722 ~ Jiri Antonin Benda, Composer

• 1723 ~ Christian Ernst Graf, Composer

• 1743 ~ Niels Schiorring, Composer

• 1792 ~ Francesco Antonio Rosetti, Composer, died

• 1818 ~ Edward John Hopkins, English organist and composer

• 1819 ~ Ernst Ludwig Gerber, Composer, died at the age of 72

• 1846 ~ Ricardo Drigo, Composer

• 1889 ~ Eugenio Terziani, Composer, died at the age of 64

• 1890 ~ Samuel Parkman Tuckerman, Composer, died at the age of 71

• 1896 ~ Wilfred Pelletier, Canadian conductor for Voice of Firestone

• 1908 ~ Lucino Tinio Sacramento, Composer

• 1914 ~ Natko Devcic, Composer

• 1917 ~ Lena Horne, American singer of popular music

• 1917 ~ “Buddy” Rich, American jazz drummer and bandleader

• 1918 ~ Stuart Foster, American singer

• 1921 ~ Gordon Reynolds, Musician

• 1923 ~ Claude Antoine Terrasse, Composer, died at the age of 56

• 1925 ~ Will Gay Bottje, Composer

• 1929 ~ Alexander Kelly, Pianist and teacher

• 1930 ~ June Valli, American singer on Your Hit Parade

• 1931 ~ James Loughran, British conductor

• 1932 ~ Martin Mailman, American composer

• 1936 ~ Pauls Dambis, Composer

• 1939 ~ Chris Hinze, Dutch flutist

• 1939 ~ Lindembergue Cardoso, Composer

• 1939 ~ Frank Sinatra made his first appearance with Harry James’ band. Sinatra was center stage at the Hippodrome Theatre in Baltimore, MD, where he sang My Love for You

• 1941 ~ Micki Grant, Composer

• 1941 ~ Mike Leander Farr, Record producer

• 1943 ~ Florence Ballard, Singer with the Supremes

• 1944 ~ Glenn Shorrock, Australian singer with Little River Band

• 1946 ~ Billy Brown, singer with Ray, Goodman, Brown

• 1946 ~ Michael Zadora, Composer, died at the age of 64

• 1947 ~ Jasper van’t Hof, Dutch jazz pianist (Live in Montreux)

• 1951 ~ Andrew Scott, Welch rock guitarist

• 1951 ~ “Victor Borge Show,” last aired on NBC-TV
More information about Borge

• 1953 ~ Gote Carlid, Composer, died at the age of 32

• 1956 ~ “Pipe Dream” closed at Shubert Theater New York City after 245 performances

• 1956 ~ “Shangri-La” closed at Winter Garden Theater New York City after 21 performances

• 1959 ~ Lazare Saminsky, Composer, died at the age of 76

• 1960 ~ Clarence Cameron White, Composer, died at the age of 79

• 1969 ~ Jan Evangelista Zelinka, Composer, died at the age of 76

• 1982 ~ “Lena Horne: Lady, Music” closed at Nederlander New York City after 333 performances

• 1983 ~ Bo Gentry, Songwriter and producer, died

• 1985 ~ Yul Brynner left his role as the King of Siam after 4,600 performances in The King and I at the Broadway Theatre in New York City. The show had run, on and off, for over 34 years and 191 performances.

• 1987 ~ Federico Mompou, Composer, died at the age of 94

• 1993 ~ “Les Miserables” opened at Point Theatre, Dublin

• 1995 ~ Phyllis Hyman, Rhythm and Blues Jazz singer, died at 45

• 1996 ~ “State Fair,” closed at Music Box Theater New York City after 118 performances

• 2001 ~ Chet Atkins, whose guitar style influenced a generation of rock musicians even as he helped develop an easygoing country style to compete with it, died at the age of 77.

Atkins recorded more than 75 albums of guitar instrumentals and sold more than 75 million albums. He played on hundreds of hit records, including those of Elvis Presley (Heartbreak Hotel), Hank Williams Sr. (Your Cheatin’ Heart, Jambalaya) and The Everly Brothers (Wake Up Little Susie). As an executive with RCA Records for nearly two decades beginning in 1957, Atkins played a part in the careers of Roy Orbison, Jim Reeves, Charley Pride, Dolly Parton Jerry Reed, Waylon Jennings, Eddy Arnold and many others. “It’s impossible to capsulize his life – due to the profound impact he’s had as a wonderful human being and incredible member of our industry,” said Joe Galante, chairman of the RCA Label Group in Nashville. “His artistry and his influence as an industry leader have impacted so many. “There is no way to replace him nor what he has meant to music and our Nashville community.” Atkins helped craft the lush Nashville Sound, using string sections and lots of echo to make records that appealed to older listeners not interested in rock music. Among his notable productions are The End of the World by Skeeter Davis and He’ll Have to Go by Reeves. “I realized that what I liked, the public would like, too,” Atkins said in a 1996 interview with The Associated Press. ‘”Cause I’m kind of square.”

Chester Burton Atkins was born June 20, 1924, on a farm near Luttrell, Tenn., about 20 miles northeast of Knoxville. His elder brother Jim Atkins also played guitar, and went on to perform with Les Paul. Chet Atkins’ first professional job was as a fiddler on WNOX in Knoxville, where his boss was singer Bill Carlisle. “He was horrible,” Carlisle said at a tribute concert to Atkins in 1997. “But I heard him during a break playing guitar and decided to feature him on that.” Atkins’ unusual fingerpicking style, a pseudoclassical variation influenced by such diverse talents as Merle Travis and Django Reinhardt, got him hired and fired from jobs at radio stations all over the country. Atkins sometimes joked that early on his playing sounded “like two guitarists playing badly.” During the 1940s he toured with many acts, including Red Foley, The Carter Family and Kitty Wells. RCA executive Steve Sholes took Atkins on as a protege in the 1950s, using him as the house guitarist on recording sessions. RCA began issuing instrumental albums by Atkins in 1953. George Harrison, whose guitar work on early Beatles records is heavily influenced by Atkins, wrote the liner notes for “Chet Atkins Picks on the Beatles.” Sholes put Atkins in charge of RCA Nashville when he was promoted in 1957. There, he helped Nashville survive the challenge of rock ‘n’ roll with the Nashville Sound. The lavish sound has been criticized by purists who prefer their country music raw and unadorned. Atkins was unrepentant, saying that at the time his goal was simply “to keep my job.” “And the way you do that is you make a hit record once in a while,” he said in 1993. “And the way you do that is you give the audience something different.” Atkins quit his job as an executive in the 1970s and concentrated on playing his guitar. He’s collaborated with a wide range of artists on solo albums, including Mark Knopfler, Paul McCartney, Eric Johnson, George Benson, Susie Bogguss and Earl Klugh. At the time he became ill, Atkins had just released a CD, “The Day Finger Pickers took over the World.” He also had begun regular Monday night performances at a Nashville club. “If I know I’ve got to go do a show, I practice quite a bit, because you can’t get out there and embarrass yourself.” Atkins said in 1996. “So I thought, if I play every week I won’t be so rusty and I’ll play a lot better.”

 

 

Daily Listening Assignments ~ June 29, 2021

Posted by MaryO on

 

Today’s assignment is a little different but it shows how determination, hard work, practice and believing in yourself can take you a long way.

Inverary and District Pipe Band didn’t sound so great when they started out but…

Adapted from https://idpb.co.uk/history/

In September 2003, the Inveraray Piping Project was born. With the assistance of local people, Tuesday nights at Inveraray Primary School became the time and venue for weekly piping tuition and practices and the small group began to grow. By May 2004, there were five young pipers and a drummer who remain members to this day.

In 2005, built upon these foundations, Inveraray and District Pipe Band was formed. It competed in its first competition in the Novice Juvenile grade at Cowal Games in August 2005, with borrowed drums and its young members clad in uniforms of various colours.

  • 2006
    • Winner of the overall Scottish award for Best Lottery Funded Project (and a win in the UK-wide “Local Legend” category for Stuart Liddell) in the National Lottery Awards.
    • Prize winner in all five RSPBA major Championships in the Novice Juvenile grade in IDPB’s first full year.
  • 2007
    • Winner of four out of five Novice Juvenile major championships, including the Worlds.
  • 2008
    • Winner of four out of five Juvenile major championships, including the Worlds.
  • 2009
    • Winner of all five major championships in Grade 2.

The Grade 2 band’s success in 2009 meant that it was immediately promoted to Grade 1 for the 2010 season.

The band continues to be a regular prize winner at the major events and a centre of excellence built on strong foundations. The attention to detail and focus on individual and collective playing quality that were a feature of its embryonic beginnings remain to this day in all sections of the band. The current incarnation of IDPB is less parochial- in fact, truly international- with members from several continents. The membership features highly decorated individual performers; graduates of the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland; an abundance of capable composers and arrangers, and several performers with a wider musical pedigree than purely piping or drumming.

In 2017 Inveraray and District Pipe Band won the World Pipe Band Championships.  A total of 219 bands including 8,000 pipers from 15 nations took part in the contest, now in its 70th year.

 

Edit!  I posted this at 9:00 am EST (June 30, 2018) and later in the day, Inveraray and District Pipe Band won the Grade One European Pipe Band Championship.

Another Edit! The band won the World Championships for the second time in 2019.

This is Inveraray and District’s performance of the band’s Masterblaster medley which won the band the Grade One European Pipe Band Championship on Saturday 30 June 2018. The event was held in a meticulously prepared, sun-scorched Grant Park. These championships will be moving on to Inverness in 2019 after six very successful years in Forres.

 

June 29: Today’s Music History

Posted by MaryO on

today

 

 

 

 

Be sure your student reads and listens to Today’s Daily Listening Assignment

• 1696 ~ Michel Lambert, Composer, died

• 1738 ~ Constantin Reindl, Composer

• 1783 ~ August Alexander Klengel, Composer

• 1842 ~ Josef Labor, Composer

• 1850 ~ Joseph Paul Skelly, Composer

• 1864 ~ Anton Beer-Walbrun, Composer

• 1870 ~ Joseph Carl Breil, Composer

• 1871 ~ Luisa Tetrazzini, Italian operatic singer. Her dazzling technique made her one of the most famous sopranos of her time.

• 1874 ~ Georg Gohler, Composer

• 1885 ~ Andre Gailhard, Composer

• 1886 ~ George Frederick Boyle, Composer

• 1888 ~ First (known) recording of classical music made, Handel’s Israel in Egypt on wax cylinder

• 1893 ~ Aare Merikanto, Composer

• 1897 ~ Ottmar Gerster, Composer

• 1901 ~ Hendrik Diels, Flemish conductor

• 1901 ~ Nelson Eddy, American baritone and actor, often performed with Jeanette MacDonald

• 1903 ~ Rentaro Taki, Composer, died at the age of 23

• 1908 ~ Rene Gerber, Composer

• 1908 ~ Leroy Anderson, Composer
Read more about Anderson

• 1910 ~ Frank Loesser, American songwriter and composer of musical comedies

• 1911 ~ Bernard Herrmann, Composer

• 1914 ~ Rafael Kubelík, Czech-born Swiss conductor and composer of operas, symphonies and concertos

• 1922 ~ Ralph Burns, Musician, pianist, composer and arranger

• 1922 ~ Elmer J. ‘Mousey’ Alexander, Drummer with Alexanders the Great

• 1923 ~ Chou Wen-Chung, Chinese composer

• 1923 ~ Gustave Adolph Kerker, Composer, died at the age of 66

• 1924 ~ Ezra Laderman, American composer

• 1925 ~ Hale Smith, Composer

• 1929 ~ Michio Mamaia, Composer

• 1936 ~ Leonard Lee, American vocalist

• 1938 ~ Billy Storm, Singer with the Valiants

• 1938 ~ Edmund Falkiner, Jazz saxophonist

• 1940 ~ Viacheslav Artyomov, Composer

• 1941 ~ Ignacy Jan Paderewski, Polish statesman and pianist, died in New York at the age of 80

• 1942 ~ Dmitri Shostakovich’s Seventh Symphony, premiered

• 1943 ~ Roger Ruskin Spear, English saxophonist, kazoo with The Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band

• 1945 ~ Little Eva (Boyd), Singer

• 1946 ~ “Are You with It?” closed at Century Theater New York City after 264 performances

• 1946 ~ “Billion Dollar Baby” closed at Alvin Theater New York City after 219 performances

• 1948 ~ Ian Paice, Musician, drums with Paice Ashton Lord

• 1953 ~ Jules van Nuffel, Composer, died at the age of 70

• 1955 ~ Bill Haley and His Comets reached the top of the pop music charts with Rock Around the Clock. The smash hit stayed there for eight straight weeks. The song was featured in the film Blackboard Jungle. Most consider the hit song the first rock ’n’ roll single.

• 1963 ~ “Little Me” closed at Lunt-Fontanne Theater New York City after 257 performances

• 1963 ~ The Beatles’ 1st song From Me to You hits UK charts

• 1964 ~ Milenko Zivkovic, composer, died at the age of 63

• 1966 ~ Arthur Meulemans, Belgian Composer, died at the age of 82

• 1968 ~ Tiptoe Through the Tulips by Tiny Tim peaked at #17

• 1969 ~ Shorty Long, Soul singer and pianist, died at the age of 29

• 1969 ~ Vesselin Stoyanov, Composer, died at the age of 67

• 1970 ~ NBC presented an evening of exciting and entertaining TV with the award-winning Liza Minelli Special.

• 1980 ~ “Sweeney Todd” closed at Uris Theater New York City after 557 performances

• 1984 ~ Singer Bruce Springsteen kicked off his first U.S. tour in three years, before 17,700 fans at the Civic Center in St. Paul, MN. Music critics called the Boss, “the most exciting performer in rock.”

• 1992 ~ “Salome” opened at Circle in Sq Theater New York City for 9 performances

• 1994 ~ Kurt Eichhorn, Conductor, died at the age of 85

• 1994 ~ Ray Crane, Trumpeter, died at the age of 63

• 1998 ~ Horst Jankowski passed away

• 2001 ~ Kimo Wilder McVay, a veteran talent agent who promoted singer Don Ho into an international star, died at the age of 73. McVay introduced Ho, known for his song Tiny Bubbles, to tourist audiences in the 1960s at his Duke Kahanamoku’s nightclub in Waikiki. He represented Hawaii’s top talents in an up-and-down career that spanned nearly five decades, but slowed his work when diagnosed with prostate cancer two years ago. McVay was the son of Navy Capt. Charles B. McVay III, who was found guilty at a court-martial trial of failing to steer a zigzag course to evade a Japanese submarine that sank the USS Indianapolis in 1945. The younger McVay’s years of trying to clear his father’s name resulted in congressional action last year to exonerate the Indianapolis’ skipper, who committed suicide in 1968.

• 2002 ~ Rosemary Clooney, the mellow-voiced singer who co-starred with Bing Crosby in “White Christmas” and staged a dramatic comeback after her career was nearly destroyed by drugs and alcohol, died. She was 74. Clooney soared to fame with her 1951 record of Come on-a My House, and became a star in television and films. Her career was sidelined by her marriage to Oscar-winning actor Jose Ferrer and the births of their five children. The pair divorced, and her attempts to return to performing were sabotaged by her erratic behavior. Having undergone a series of emotional upsets – she was devastated by Martin Luther King’s assassination, and was present in the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles when Robert F. Kennedy was shot – the blond singer had a breakdown during a 1968 engagement in Reno. She underwent harrowing confinement in a psychotic ward, then began rebuilding her life, gradually resuming her career and reaching new heights as a singer. She performed a concert with Crosby in the Christmas of 1975 at the Los Angeles Music Center, and the pair continued on to Chicago, New York and London. Clooney won a new record contract, and singing dates poured in. In 1995, she received an Emmy Award nomination for guest actress in a drama series for her role on “ER” with her nephew, actor George Clooney. He is the son of her brother, former television news anchor Nick Clooney. In 1996, Clooney married Hollywood dancer Dante DiPaolo.

• 2002 ~ Edmund Anderson, a former stockbroker and producer who was close friends with musician Duke Ellington, died. He was 89. Anderson and Ellington met in 1936 and remained friends until Ellington’s death in 1974. Anderson was said to have pressed Ellington to perform at Carnegie Hall, which he did for the first time in 1943. Anderson worked for his father’s brokerage, Anderson & Company, but had a strong interest in music and also produced broadcasts for radio, including a program known as “The Edgar Bergen-Charlie McCarthy Show.” He also composed music, including the love song Flamingo, written in collaboration with Ted Grouya and recorded by Ellington and his band.

Daily Listening Assignments ~ June 28, 2021

Posted by MaryO on

 

Korobeiniki is a nineteenth-century Russian folk song that tells the story of a meeting between a peddler and a girl, describing their haggling over goods in a veiled metaphor for courtship.

Outside Russia, “Korobeiniki” is widely known as the Tetris theme.

 

Piano duet:

 

Orchestral version:

 

For Boomwhackers:

Vocal:

 

Ragtime:

 

Balalaika:

 

Two bassoons:

The Red Army Choir:

Korobeiniki/Tetris is available in Piano Maestro on the iPad and I have several levels of sheet music for anyone who is interested.

Enjoy!

June 28: Today’s Music History

Posted by MaryO on

today

 

Be sure your student reads and listens to Today’s Daily Listening Assignment

 

• 1547 ~ Cristofano Malvezzi, Composer

• 1586 ~ Paul Siefert, Composer

• 1641 ~ King Henry VIII, English monarch and occasional composer

• 1734 ~ Jean-Jacques Beauvarget-Charpentier, Composer

• 1742 ~ Johann Joseph Ignaz Brentner, Composer, died at the age of 52

• 1788 ~ Johann Christoph Vogel, Composer, died at the age of 32

• 1798 ~ Pierre Dutillieu, Composer, died at the age of 44

• 1806 ~ Napoleon Coste, Composer

• 1815 ~ Robert Franz, Composer

• 1831 ~ Joseph Joachim, Hungarian violinist, composer and conductor
Read more about Joachim

• 1852 ~ Hans Huber, Composer

• 1853 ~ Edwin Arthur Jones, Composer

• 1855 ~ Giovanni Agostino Perotti, Composer, died at the age of 86

• 1857 ~ Joseph Fischhof, Composer, died at the age of 53

• 1872 ~ Ludwig Friedrich Hetsch, Composer, died at the age of 66

• 1874 ~ Oley Speaks, Composer

• 1876 ~ August W Ambros, Austria musicologist, died at the age of 59

• 1885 ~ Giuseppe Mule, Composer

• 1887 ~ Boleslav Vomacka, Composer

• 1890 ~ Edouard Gregoir, Composer, died at the age of 67

• 1891 ~ Jose Inzenga y Castellanos, Composer, died at the age of 63

• 1893 ~ Luciano Gallet, Composer

• 1893 ~ Nils Bjorkander, Composer

• 1895 ~ Kazimierz Sikorski, Composer

• 1902 ~ Richard Rogers, Academy Award-winning American composer for the musical theater
Read more about Rogers

• 1904 ~ Wlodzimierz Pozniak, Composer

• 1904 ~ Daniel Decatur Emmett passed away

• 1906 ~ Safford Cape, American/Belgian conductor, composer and music historian

• 1909 ~ Arnold Shaw, Composer

• 1910 ~ Gustave Leon Huberti, Composer, died at the age of 67

• 1912 ~ Audrey Langford, Singing teacher

• 1912 ~ Sergiu Celibidache, conductor

• 1913 ~ George Walter Selwyn Lloyd, English Composer

• 1914 ~ Lester Flatt, Country music entertainer, guitar with Flatt and Scruggs

• 1917 ~ Willem “Wim” Sonneveld, Dutch singer and actor in My Fair Lady

• 1923 ~ Pete (Walter) Candoli, Musician, trumpeter

• 1936 ~ Giselher W Kleber, German opera composer

• 1925 ~ George Morgan, Singer

• 1930 ~ Nikolay Nikolayevich Karetnikov, Composer

• 1933 ~ Gunnar Reynir Sveinsson, Composer

• 1936 ~ Cathy Carr, Singer

• 1940 ~ As a summer replacement for blind, piano virtuoso Alec Templeton, the Quiz Kids was first heard on radio. The show continued on NBC until 1953.

• 1945 ~ Dave Knights, Musician, bass player with Procol Harum

• 1946 ~ Robert Xavier Rodriguez, Composer

• 1950 ~ Henry Balfour Gardiner, Composer, died at the age of 72

• 1957 ~ Ede Poldini, Composer, died at the age of 88

• 1979 ~ Paul Dessau, German Composer and conductor, died at the age of 84

• 1980 ~ José Iturbi, Spanish/American pianist, died at the age of 84

• 1980 ~ Yoshiro Irino, Composer, died at the age of 58

• 1981 ~ “Piaf” closed at Plymouth Theater New York City after 165 performances

• 1987 ~ “Dreamgirls” opened at Ambassador Theater New York City for 177 performances

• 1996 ~ Willard F. McMurry, Musician, died at the age of 89

• 1997 ~ “Master Class,” closed at Golden Theater New York City after 601 performances

• 1997 ~ “Steel Peer,” closed at Richard Rodgers Theater New York City after 76 performances

• 2001 ~ Rene Villanueva, a social activist who co-founded a pioneering Mexican folk music group, died at the age of 67. Villanueva was a co-founder of the group Los Folkloristas in 1966 and recorded more than 12 albums with the group, which helped spread and popularize the music of Mexico’s Indian and other traditional cultures. He left the group last year as his illness advanced, but he made a final recording last week with Indian musicians. Born in Oaxaca in 1933, Villanueva earned a degree in chemical engineering as well as studying painting and music. Once a member of the Mexican Communist Party, he was an enthusiastic supporter of the Zapatista National Liberation Army in Chiapas and performed in concerts to support the rebel movement.

• 2001 ~ Scott Merrill, a Broadway star who also played Macheath in the 1954 production of “The Threepenny Opera”, died at the age of 82. Merrill received positive reviews for his performance in “The Threepenny Opera” by Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht, and performed at the Theater de Lys in Greenwich Village. His role as Macheath was his first nondancing part in New York, where he also attracted notice in shows such as “Bloomer Girl,” “Paint Your Wagon” and a revival of “Pal Joey.” His first role in New York was in “Lady in the Dark,” with Danny Kaye, Gertrude Lawrence and Victor Mature. Merrill was born in Baltimore, Md.

• 2002 ~ Author William F. Dufty, who co-wrote Billie Holiday’s autobiography and became Gloria Swanson’s last husband, died from complications from cancer. He was 86. Dufty was a playwright, musician, ghostwriter of about 40 books, head speechwriter to Hubert Humphrey and reporter and editor at the New York Post. Dufty, who became good friends with jazz singer Holiday, helped write her autobiography “Lady Sings the Blues”. In 1975, he also wrote “Sugar Blues”, a popular nutrition book about the dangers of sugar in the diet. He became friends with Yoko Ono and former Beatle John Lennon after translating a Japanese book that launched the macrobiotic food revolution, Georges Ohsawa’s “You Are All Sanpaku”. Dufty married Swanson, a silent screen star, in 1976, and the marriage lasted until her death in 1983.

• 2016 ~ Scotty Moore, American guitarist (for Elvis), died at the age of 84

June 27: Today’s Music History

Posted by MaryO on

sunglass-smiley

Happy Sunglasses Day!

 

Be sure your student reads and listens to Today’s Daily Listening Assignment

 

 

• 1679 ~ Pablo Bruna, Composer, died at the age of 68

• 1718 ~ Wenzel Raimund Pirck, Composer

• 1745 ~ Johann Nepomuk Went, Composer

• 1789 ~ Philipp Friedrich Silcher, Composer

• 1805 ~ Stephen Elvey, Composer

• 1812 ~ John Pike Hullah, Composer

• 1814 ~ Johann Friedrich Reichardt, Composer, died at the age of 61

• 1819 ~ Carl Albert Loeschhorn, Composer

• 1821 ~ August Conradi, Composer

• 1829 ~ Louis-Sebastien Lebrun, Composer, died at the age of 64

• 1832 ~ Claude-Joseph Rouget de Lisla, Composer, died at the age of 72

• 1933 ~ Vladislav Ivanovich Zaremba, Composer

• 1850 ~ Jacob Adolf Hagg, Composer

• 1859 ~ Mildred Hill, American organist, pianist and teacher, composed Happy Birthday To You along with Patty Smith Hill, her younger sister, who wrote the lyrics. The first title was Good Morning to All.

• 1885 ~ Arthur Harmat, Composer

• 1885 ~ Chichester Bell and Charles S. Tainter applied for a patent for the gramophone. The patent was granted on May 4, 1886.

• 1889 ~ Carlotta Patti, Italian soprano, died

• 1889 ~ Whitney Eugene Thayer, Composer, died at the age of 50

• 1898 ~ Tibor Harsanyi, Composer

• 1908 ~ Hans de Jong, Musician and conductor

• 1909 ~ Gianandrea Gavazzeni, Composer

• 1910 ~ Karel Reiner, Czech composer and pianist

• 1911 ~ V K Narayana Menon, Composer

• 1915 ~ Hendrik W van Leeuwen, Musician

• 1916 ~ Hallvard Olav Johnsen, Composer

• 1917 ~ Ben Homer, Composer and songwriter

• 1922 ~ George Walker, American composer and pianist

• 1954 ~ Elmo Hope, Pianist, The Elmo Hope Trio

• 1924 ~ Rosalie Allen (Julie Bedra), Country singer and yodeler

• 1925 ~ (Jerome) ‘Doc’ Pomus, Songwriter, Atlantic Records co-owner, inducted into Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992

• 1931 ~ Alojz Srebotnjak, Composer

• 1931 ~ Ryszard Kwiatkowski, Composer

• 1932 ~ Hugh Wood, Composer

• 1934 ~ Anna Moffo, Opera Singer with the Metropolitan Opera from 1959 until 1969

• 1942 ~ John Howard McGuire, Composer

• 1942 ~ Frank Mills, Musician, piano, composer of Music Box Dancer

• 1954 ~ Bruce Johnston (1944) Grammy Award-winning songwriter in 1976, with The Beach Boys

• 1944 ~ Werner Wehrli, Composer, died at the age of 52

• 1946 ~ Daria Semegen, Composer

• 1946 ~ Janice Giteck, Composer

• 1954 ~ Francis L Casadesus, French violinist, composer and conductor, died at the age of 83

• 1955 ~ “Julius LaRosa Show,” debuted on CBS-TV

• 1959 ~ West Side Story, with music by Leonard Bernstein, closed after 734 performances on Broadway. The show remains one of the brightest highlights in Broadway history.

• 1962 ~ Two albums of melancholy music by Jackie Gleason received gold record honors. Music, Martinis and Memories and Music for Lovers Only got the gold. Both were issued by Capitol Records in Hollywood.

• 1963 ~ Brenda Lee inked a new recording contract with Decca Records. She was guaranteed one million dollars over the next 20 years.

• 1964 ~ Daniel Lazarus, Composer, died at the age of 65

• 1964 ~ Jan & Dean released Little Old Lady From Pasadena

 

• 1964 ~ Ernest Borgnine and Ethel Merman were married. It did not turn out to be one of Hollywood’s most enduring marriages. The couple broke up 38 days later.

• 1969 ~ Richard Vance Maxfield, Composer, died at the age of 42

• 1970 ~ Mariah Carey, Singer

• 1970 ~ The Jackson 5: Marlon, Tito, Jackie, Randy and Michael, jumped to number one on the music charts with The Love You Save. The song stayed at the top of the charts for two weeks. It was the third of four number one hits in a row for the group. The other three were I Want You Back, ABC and I’ll Be There. In 15 years (from 1969 to 1984), The Jackson 5/Jacksons had 23 hits, scored two platinum singles and one gold record.

• 1970, The newly formed Queen featuring Freddie Mercury (possibly still known as Freddie Bulsara) on vocals, guitarist Brian May, drummer Roger Taylor and Mike Grose on bass played their first gig at Truro City Hall, Cornwall, England. They were billed as Smile, Brian and Roger’s previous band, for whom the booking had been made originally. Original material at this time included an early version of ‘Stone Cold Crazy’.

• 1971 ~ “You’re a Good Man Charlie Brown” closed at Golden New York City after 31 performances

• 1971 ~ Promoter Bill Graham closed the Fillmore East in New York City. It was a spin-off of San Francisco’s legendary rock ’n’ roll palace, Fillmore West. The New York City landmark laid claim to having hosted every major rock group of the 1960s.

• 1975 ~ Robert Stolz, Austrian Composer, died at the age of 94

• 1976 ~ “Pacific Overtures” closed at Winter Garden New York City after 193 performances

• 1980 ~ Steve Peregrin Took, Percussionist, died at the age of 31

• 1981 ~ Bette Davis Eyes by Kim Carnes returned to #1 slot

• 1982 ~ “Dancin'” closed at Broadhurst Theater New York City after 1,774 performances

• 1982 ~ “Play Me a Country Song” opened & closed at Virginia Theater New York City

• 1992 ~ Allan Jones, Vocalist and actor in Show Boat, died of lung cancer at the age of 84

• 1992 ~ Stefanie Ann Sargent, Guitarist, died at the age of 24

• 1993 ~ “Falsettos” closed at John Golden Theater New York City after 487 performances

• 1995 ~ Lionel Edmund “Sonny” Taylor, musician, died at the age of 70

• 1995 ~ Prez “Kidd” Kenneth, blues singer/guitarist, died at the age of 61

• 2001 ~ Chico O’Farrill, the Afro-Cuban jazz pioneer who composed ballads and fiery, big band bebop for such greats as Benny Goodman, Stan Kenton and Dizzy Gillespie, died at the age of 79. Born Arturo O’Farrill in Havana, the trumpeter was most renowned as a composer and arranger of extended jazz pieces. He became one of the creators of Afro-Cuban jazz, dubbed Cubop, a melding of big-band Cuban music with elements of modern jazz. O’Farrill toiled largely in obscurity for more than 50 years. But like the musicians of Cuba’s Buena Vista Social Club, he had recently enjoyed a renaissance. His comeback began in 1995, with the release of his album “Pure Emotion,” a Grammy nominee for best Latin jazz performance. He released two other acclaimed albums, “Heart of a Legend” in 1999 and last year’s “Carambola.”

• 2002 ~ John Entwistle, the bass player for veteran British rock band The Who, died in Las Vegas at age 57, just one day before the group was set to begin a North American tour in the city, officials said.
More information about Entwistle

Daily Listening Assignments ~ June 26, 2021

Posted by MaryO on

 

Pictures at an Exhibition is a suite of ten pieces (plus a recurring, varied Promenade) composed for the piano by Russian composer Modest Mussorgsky in 1874.

The suite is Mussorgsky’s most famous piano composition and has become a showpiece for virtuoso pianists. It has become further known through various orchestrations and arrangements produced by other musicians and composers, with Maurice Ravel’s arrangement being by far the most recorded and performed.

You can download the sheet music at IMSP or I have a copy of the book, as well as simplified sheet music.

 

 

The work opens with a brilliant touch – a “promenade” theme (above) that reemerges throughout as a transition amid the changing moods of the various pictures.

The ten pictures Mussorgsky depicts are:

  • a gnome-shaped nutcracker;
  • a troubadour plaintively singing outside an ancient castle;
  • children vigorously playing and quarreling in a park;
  • a lumbering wooden Polish ox-cart;
  • a ballet of peeping chicks as they hatch from their shells;
  • an argument between two Warsaw Jews, one haughty and vain, the other poor and garrulous;
  • shrill women and vendors in a crowded marketplace;
  • the eerie, echoing gloom of catacombs beneath Paris;
  • the hut of a grotesque bone-chomping witch of Russian folklore named Baba Yaga;
  • and a design for an entrance gate to Kiev.

 

The whole piece for piano.  See if you can tell which pictures are which.

 

Orchestrated, with the full score:

 

Just the Baba Yaga section:

The Emerson, Lake and Palmer version:

June 26: Today’s Music History

Posted by MaryO on

today

 

Be sure your student reads and listens to Today’s Daily Listening Assignment

 

• 1284 ~ The Pied Piper exacted his revenge upon the German town of Hamelin this day. The townspeople had promised to pay the piper a large fee if he could rid their town the nasty rats running all over the place. He had played his trusty pipe and the rats had followed him out of town and into the River Weser. But once the rodents were eliminated, the local folks decided not to pay after all. The piper was not pleased and repaid the townspeople by playing his pipe for the children of Hamelin, just like he had done for the rats. And just like the rats, the children followed him out of town.

 

• 1582 ~ Johannes Schultz, Composer

• 1657 ~ Tobias Michael, Composer, died at the age of 65

• 1661 ~ Lazaro Valvasensi, Composer, died at the age of 76

• 1747 ~ Leopold Jan Antonin Kozeluh, Composer

• 1778 ~ Angelo Antonio Caroli, Composer, died at the age of 77

• 1798 ~ Eugene Godecharle, Composer, died at the age of 56

• 1823 ~ Frederick Bowen Jewson, Composer

• 1824 ~ Moritz Furstenau, Composer

• 1836 ~ Claude-Joseph Rouget de Lisle, author and composer of the Marseillaise, died

• 1870 ~ Wagner’s opera “Valkyrie” premiered in Munich

• 1874 ~ Mikhail Vladimirovich Ivanov-Boretsky, Composer

• 1875 ~ Camille Zeckwer, Composer

• 1878 ~ Albert Siklos, Composer

• 1891 ~ Heinrich Lemacher, Composer

• 1893 ~ “Big Bill” Broonzy, American blues singer and guitarist

• 1894 ~ Bill Wirges, American orchestra leader

• 1901 ~ William Busch, Composer

• 1902 ~ Antonia Brico, Conductor and pianist. Because there were so few opportunities for female conductors, she organized the Woman’s Symphony Orchestra in 1935.

• 1909 ~ “Col Tom” Parker (Dries Van Kruijk), Elvis Presley’s manager

• 1912 ~ Gustav Mahler’s 9th Symphony premiered in Vienna

• 1914 ~ Richard Maltby, Bandleader

• 1914 ~ Wolfgang Windgassen, German tenor with the Stuttgart Opera

• 1916 ~ Guiseppe Taddei, Italian baritone

• 1924 ~ Syd Lawrence, Bandleader

• 1924 ~ Ziegfeld Follies opened on Broadway

• 1928 ~ Jacob Druckman, American composer

• 1931 ~ Lucien Goethals, Composer

• 1933 ~ Claudio Abbado, Italian conductor
More information about Abbado

• 1933 ~ The Kraft Music Hall debuted. It turned out to be one of radio’s longest-running hits. The first program presented Paul Whiteman and his orchestra. SingerAl Jolson became the host of the show shortly thereafter. Several years later, crooner Bing Crosby was named the host. The Kraft Music Hall continued on NBC radio until 1949 and then on TV for many more years; the first year as Milton Berle Starring in the Kraft Music Hall, then Kraft Music Hall Presents: The Dave King Show followed by Perry Como’s Kraft Music Hall for four seasons. From 1967 on, The Kraft Music Hall featured a different host.

• 1934 ~ Dave Grusin, Composer of film scores

• 1934 ~ Luis Felipe Pires, Composer

• 1940 ~ Billy Davis, Jr., Singer with The 5th Dimension

• 1942 ~ Larry Taylor, Musician, bass with Canned Heat

• 1943 ~ John Allen Strang, Composer

• 1943 ~ Georgie Fame (Clive Powell), Singer

• 1945 ~ Barry Schrader, Composer

• 1945 ~ Erno Rapee, Composer, died at the age of 54

• 1945 ~ Nikolay Nikolayevich Tcherepnin, Composer, died at the age of 72

• 1953 ~ Ralph Ezell, American singer

• 1954 ~ Robert Davi, American opera singer/actor

• 1956 ~ Clifford Brown, American jazz trumpeter, died at the age of 25

• 1964 ~ A Hard Day’s Night was released by United Artists Records. The album featured all original material by The Beatles and became the top album in the country by July 25, 1964.

• 1965 ~ Mr. Tambourine Man, by The Byrds, reached the number one spot on the pop music charts. The song was considered by many to be the first folk-rock hit. The tune was written by Bob Dylan, as were two other hits for the group: All I Really Want to Do and My Back Pages. The group of James Roger McGinn, David Crosby, Gene Clark, Chris Hillman and Mike Clarke charted seven hits. The Byrds were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991.

• 1966 ~ “Time for Singing” closed at Broadway Theater New York City after 41 performances

• 1971 ~ Inia Te Wiata, opera singer, died

• 1971 ~ Juan Manen, Composer, died at the age of 88

• 1971 ~ “Man of La Mancha” closed at ANTA Washington Square Theater New York City after 2329 performances

• 1972 ~ David Lichine (Lichtenstein), Russian/American choreographer, died at the age of 61

• 1973 ~ Arnold Richardson, Composer, died at the age of 59

• 1973 ~ London production of “Grease” premiered

• 1977 ~ Lou Reizner, Rock vocalist/producer, died at the age of 43

• 1977 ~ Elvis Presley sang the last performance of his career, in Indianapolis. He died two months later.

• 1981 ~ Peter Kreuder, German composer, died

• 1982 ~ André Tchaikowsy, Pianist and composer, died

• 1983 ~ Walter O’Keefe, Songwriter and TV host, died at the age of 82

• 1983 ~ “Show Boat” closed at Uris Theater New York City after 73 performances

• 1984 ~ Barbra Streisand recorded Here We Are at Last

• 1991 ~ Carmine Coppola, Composer and conductor (Godfather II), died at the age of 80

• 1994 ~ Thomas Henry Wait Armstrong, Organist, died at the age of 96

• 2001 ~ French soprano Gina Cigna, famed for singing Puccini’s “Turandot”, died at the age of 101. Born in Paris in 1900, Cigna made her stage debut at Milan’s La Scala opera house at age 27 under the name Ginette Sens. Her breakthrough came two years later when she performed in Mozart’s “Don Giovanni” at La Scala under her own name. Arturo Toscanini, the conductor, was particularly fond of Cigna’s expressive voice, which received widespread acclaim. An auto accident ended Cigna’s performing career in 1947. Until 1965, she coached opera singers in Milan, Siena and Canada.