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Album Leaf (music)
''Album leaf'' is the title of numerous minor compositions by a wide variety of classical composers. It also appears in the French version, ''Feuille d'album'' or ''Feuillet d'album''; the German version ''Albumblatt'' (pl. ''Albumblätter''); the Russian version ''Листок из альбома'' (pl. ''Листки из альбома''); the Spanish and Latin-American versions ''Hoja de álbum''; and other languages. Many of these pieces are for piano solo, but the title has also been used for other instrumental pieces in the salon music genre, and for vocal pieces. They tend to be short, pleasant, and not particularly demanding on the performer. There is no standard form or structure; the title ''Album leaf'' is quite arbitrary, and these pieces could just as easily have been called ''Prelude'', ''Impromptu'', ''Romance'', ''Humoresque'' or other names. Originally, the term "Album leaf" was used for pieces written in dedication to a friend or admirer, to be inserted i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Piano
The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboard, which is a row of keys (small levers) that the performer presses down or strikes with the fingers and thumbs of both hands to cause the hammers to strike the strings. It was invented in Italy by Bartolomeo Cristofori around the year 1700. Description The word "piano" is a shortened form of ''pianoforte'', the Italian term for the early 1700s versions of the instrument, which in turn derives from ''clavicembalo col piano e forte'' (key cimbalom with quiet and loud)Pollens (1995, 238) and ''fortepiano''. The Italian musical terms ''piano'' and ''forte'' indicate "soft" and "loud" respectively, in this context referring to the variations in volume (i.e., loudness) produced in response to a pianist's touch or pressure on the keys: the grea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
August Bungert
Friedrich August Bungert (14 March 1845 – 26 October 1915) was a German opera composer and poet. Biography Early life Bungert was born in Mülheim. His unusual musical talent was noticed and nurtured at high school by his teacher, Heinrich Kufferath, the brother of the composer Ferdinand Kufferath. Bungert's father, a wealthy merchant and an eminent member of the community, was unenthusiastic about his son's ambitions and considered his son's musical ability to be an "ill-fated inclination". He would have preferred his son to undertake a career as a merchant or a doctor. Only his mother supported him, but she died when August Bungert was ten. In the aftermath of her death, the conflict between father and son became more intense. Upon finishing high school at 16, Bungert fled to Cologne. He attended the Conservatorium there and was taught by Ferdinand Kufferath, his high school teacher's brother. In Cologne, he was discovered by the composer Max Bruch's sister, who had ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edward German
Sir Edward German (17 February 1862 – 11 November 1936) was an English musician and composer of Welsh descent, best remembered for his extensive output of incidental music for the stage and as a successor to Arthur Sullivan in the field of English comic opera. Some of his light operas, especially '' Merrie England'', are still performed. As a youth, German played the violin and led the town orchestra of Whitchurch, Shropshire. He also began to compose music. While performing and teaching violin at the Royal Academy of Music, German began to build a career as a composer in the mid-1880s, writing serious music as well as light opera. In 1888, he became music director of the Globe Theatre in London. He provided popular incidental music for many productions at the Globe and other London theatres, including ''Richard III'' (1889), ''Henry VIII'' (1892) and ''Nell Gwynn'' (1900). He also wrote symphonies, orchestral suites, symphonic poems and other works. He also wrote a consi ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Niels Gade
Niels Wilhelm Gade (22 February 1817 – 21 December 1890) was a Danish composer, conductor, violinist, organist and teacher. Together with Johan Peter Emilius Hartmann, he was the leading Danish musician of his day. Biography Gade was born in Copenhagen, the son of a joiner and instrument maker. He was intended for his father's trade, but his passion for a musician's career, made evident by the ease and skill with which he learnt to play upon a number of instruments, was not to be denied. Though he became proficient on the violin under Frederik Wexschall, and in the elements of theory under Christoph Weyse and Weyse's pupil Andreas Berggreen, he was to a great extent self-taught. He began his professional career as a violinist with the Royal Danish Orchestra, which premiered his concert overture ''Efterklange af Ossian'' ("Echoes of Ossian") in 1841. \ When the performance of his first symphony had to be delayed in Copenhagen, it was sent to Felix Mendelssohn. Mendels ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wilhelm Fitzenhagen
Wilhelm Karl Friedrich Fitzenhagen (15 September 1848 – 14 February 1890) was a German cellist, composer and teacher, best known today as the dedicatee of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky's ''Variations on a Rococo Theme''. Life Fitzenhagen was born in Seesen in the Duchy of Brunswick, where his father served as music director. Beginning at age five, he received lessons on the piano, the cello and the violin. Many times, he had to substitute for wind players absent due to various emergencies.Campbell, p. 76. At age 14, Fitzenhagen began advanced studies of the cello with Theodore Müller. Three years later, Fitzenhagen played for the Duke of Brunswick, who released him from all military service. In 1867, some noble patrons enabled him to study for a year with Friedrich Grützmacher in Dresden, A year later he was appointed to the Dresden Hofkapelle, where he started his career as soloist.MacGregor, 8:912. Fitzenhagen's playing at the 1870 Beethoven Festival in Weimar attracted the atte ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Zdeněk Fibich
Zdeněk Fibich (, 21 December 1850 in Loket (Benešov District), Všebořice – 15 October 1900 in Prague) was a List of Czech composers, Czech composer of european classical music, classical music. Among his compositions are chamber works (including two string quartets, a piano trio, piano quartet and a quintet for piano, strings and winds), symphonic poems, three symphony, symphonies, at least seven operas (the most famous probably ''Šárka (Fibich), Šárka'' and ''The Bride of Messina (opera), The Bride of Messina''), melodramas including the substantial trilogy ''Hippodamia'', liturgical music including a Mass (music), mass – a ''missa brevis''; and a large cycle (a total of 376 pieces, from the 1890s) of piano works called ''Moods, Impressions, and Reminiscences''. The piano cycle served as a diary of sorts of his love for a piano pupil, and one of the pieces formed the basis for the short instrumental work ''Poème'', for which Fibich is best remembered today. Early lif ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gabrielle Ferrari
Gabrielle Ferrari (14 September 1851 – 4 July 1921) was a French pianist and composer noted for opera. Born Gabrielle Colombari, she was born and died in Paris and studied with Charles Gounod and Théodore Dubois. Her opera ''Le Cobzar'' premiered in Monte Carlo. She married François Ferrari with whom she had four daughters. Works Ferrari composed operas and songs, writing her own text, and also for orchestral and piano performance. Selected works include: *''Le Tartare'', (1906) opera **Libretto by Elena Văcărescu (Hélène Vacaresco) *''Le dernier amour'', (1895) opera **Libretto by Paul Berlier *''Le Cobzar'', (1909) opera **Libretto by Elena Văcărescu Elena Văcărescu, or Hélène Vacaresco (September 21, 1864 in Bucharest – February 17, 1947 in Paris), was a Romanian-French aristocrat writer, twice a laureate of the Académie française. Life Through her father, Ioan Văcărescu, she desc ... (Hélène Vacaresco) and Paul Milliet *''Feuilles d'album'', Op. 7 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Antonín Dvořák
Antonín Leopold Dvořák ( ; ; 8 September 1841 – 1 May 1904) was a Czechs, Czech composer. Dvořák frequently employed rhythms and other aspects of the folk music of Moravian traditional music, Moravia and his native Bohemia, following the Romantic-era Czech nationalism, nationalist example of his predecessor Bedřich Smetana. Dvořák's style has been described as "the fullest recreation of a national idiom with that of the symphonic tradition, absorbing folk influences and finding effective ways of using them". Dvořák displayed his musical gifts at an early age, being an apt violin student from age six. The first public performances of his works were in Prague in 1872 and, with special success, in 1873, when he was 31 years old. Seeking recognition beyond the Prague area, he submitted a score of his Symphony No. 1 (Dvořák), First Symphony to a prize competition in Germany, but did not win, and the unreturned manuscript was lost until it was rediscovered many decades ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ernő Dohnányi
Ernő or Erno is a Finnish and Hungarian masculine given name. Notable people with the name include: *Ernő Balogh (1897-1989), Hungarian pianist, composer, editor, and educator *Ernő Bánk (1883-1962), Hungarian painter and teacher * Ernő Béres (born 1928), Hungarian long-distance runner and Olympic competitor *Ernő Csíki (1875- 194?), Hungarian entomologist *Ernő Dohnányi (1877–1960), Hungarian conductor, composer, and pianist *Ernő Foerk (1868–1934), Hungarian architect *Ernő Garami (1876-1935), Hungarian politician *Ernő Gereben (1907–1988), Hungarian–born Swiss chess master *Ernő Gerő (1898–1980), Hungarian Communist Party politician *Ernő Goldfinger (1902–1987), Hungarian-born British architect and furniture designer * Ernő Gubányi (born 1950), Hungarian handball player and Olympic competitor *Ernő Hetényi (1912–1999), Hungarian tibetologist, scholar and Buddhist *Ernő Jendrassik (1858-1921), Hungarian physician and medical researcher *Ernő Ki ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Frédéric Chopin
Frédéric François Chopin (born Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin; 1 March 181017 October 1849) was a Polish composer and virtuoso pianist of the Romantic period, who wrote primarily for solo piano. He has maintained worldwide renown as a leading musician of his era, one whose "poetic genius was based on a professional technique that was without equal in his generation". Chopin was born in Żelazowa Wola in the Duchy of Warsaw and grew up in Warsaw, which in 1815 became part of Congress Poland. A child prodigy, he completed his musical education and composed his earlier works in Warsaw before leaving Poland at the age of 20, less than a month before the outbreak of the November 1830 Uprising. At 21, he settled in Paris. Thereafterin the last 18 years of his lifehe gave only 30 public performances, preferring the more intimate atmosphere of the salon. He supported himself by selling his compositions and by giving piano lessons, for which he was in high demand. Chopin formed a fr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Carlos Chávez
Carlos Antonio de Padua Chávez y Ramírez (13 June 1899 – 2 August 1978) was a Mexican composer, conductor, music theorist, educator, journalist, and founder and director of the Mexican Symphonic Orchestra. He was influenced by native Mexican cultures. Of his six symphonies, the second, or '' Sinfonía india'', which uses native Yaqui percussion instruments, is probably the most popular. Biography The seventh child of a criollo family, Chávez was born on Tacuba Avenue in Mexico City, near the suburb of Popotla. His paternal grandfather, José María Chávez Alonso, a former governor of the state of Aguascalientes, had been executed by the French Army in April 1864. His father, Augustín Chávez, who died when Carlos was barely three years old, invented a plough that was produced and used in the United States. Carlos had his first piano lessons from his brother Manuel, and later on he was taught piano by Asunción Parra, Manuel Ponce, and Pedro Luis Ozagón, and har ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cécile Chaminade
Cécile Louise Stéphanie Chaminade (8 August 1857 – 13 April 1944) was a French composer and pianist. In 1913, she was awarded the Légion d'Honneur, a first for a female composer. Ambroise Thomas said, "This is not a woman who composes, but a composer who is a woman." Biography Born in Paris, Chaminade was raised in a musical family. She received her first piano lessons from her mother. Around age 10, Chaminade was assessed by Félix Le Couppey of the Conservatoire de Paris, who recommended that she study music at the Conservatoire. Her father forbade it because he believed it was improper for a girl of Chaminade's class. Her father did, however, allow Chaminade to study privately with teachers from the Conservatoire: piano with Le Couppey, violin with Marie Gabriel Augustin Savard and Martin Pierre Marsick, and music composition with Benjamin Godard. Chaminade experimented in composition as a young child, composing pieces for her cats, dogs and dolls. In 1869, she performed ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
