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Joseph Jongen
Joseph Marie Alphonse Nicolas Jongen (14 December 1873 – 12 July 1953) was a Belgian organist, composer, and music educator. Biography Jongen was born in Liège, where his parents had moved from Flanders. On the strength of an amazing precocity for music, he was admitted to the Liège Conservatoire at the extraordinarily young age of seven, and spent the next sixteen years there. Jongen won a First Prize for Fugue in 1895, an honors diploma in piano the next year, and another for organ in 1896. In 1897, he won the Belgian Prix de Rome, which allowed him to travel to Italy, Germany and France. He began composing at the age of 13, and immediately exhibited exceptional talent in that field too. By the time he published his Opus 1, he already had dozens of works to his credit. His monumental and massive First String Quartet was composed in 1894 and was submitted for the annual competition for fine arts held by the Royal Academy of Belgium, where it was awarded the top prize by the j ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Liège
Liège ( , , ; wa, Lîdje ; nl, Luik ; german: Lüttich ) is a major city and municipality of Wallonia and the capital of the Belgian province of Liège. The city is situated in the valley of the Meuse, in the east of Belgium, not far from borders with the Netherlands ( Maastricht is about to the north) and with Germany ( Aachen is about north-east). In Liège, the Meuse meets the river Ourthe. The city is part of the '' sillon industriel'', the former industrial backbone of Wallonia. It still is the principal economic and cultural centre of the region. The municipality consists of the following districts: Angleur, , Chênée, , Grivegnée, Jupille-sur-Meuse, Liège, Rocourt, and Wandre. In November 2012, Liège had 198,280 inhabitants. The metropolitan area, including the outer commuter zone, covers an area of 1,879 km2 (725 sq mi) and had a total population of 749,110 on 1 January 2008. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chamber Music
Chamber music is a form of classical music that is composed for a small group of Musical instrument, instruments—traditionally a group that could fit in a Great chamber, palace chamber or a large room. Most broadly, it includes any art music that is performed by a small number of performers, with one performer to a part (in contrast to orchestral music, in which each string part is played by a number of performers). However, by convention, it usually does not include solo instrument performances. Because of its intimate nature, chamber music has been described as "the music of friends". For more than 100 years, chamber music was played primarily by amateur musicians in their homes, and even today, when chamber music performance has migrated from the home to the concert hall, many musicians, amateur and professional, still play chamber music for their own pleasure. Playing chamber music requires special skills, both musical and social, that differ from the skills required for p ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Philadelphia Orchestra
The Philadelphia Orchestra is an American symphony orchestra, based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. One of the " Big Five" American orchestras, the orchestra is based at the Kimmel Center for the Performing Arts, where it performs its subscription concerts, numbering over 130 annually, in Verizon Hall. From its founding until 2001, the Philadelphia Orchestra gave its concerts at the Academy of Music. The orchestra continues to own the Academy, and returns there one week per year for the Academy of Music's annual gala concert and concerts for school children. The Philadelphia Orchestra's summer home is the Mann Center for the Performing Arts. It also has summer residencies at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center, and since July 2007 at the Bravo! Vail Valley Festival in Vail, Colorado. The orchestra also performs an annual series of concerts at Carnegie Hall. From its earliest days the orchestra has been active in the recording studio, making extensive numbers of recordings, pri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Leopold Stokowski
Leopold Anthony Stokowski (18 April 1882 – 13 September 1977) was a British conductor. One of the leading conductors of the early and mid-20th century, he is best known for his long association with the Philadelphia Orchestra and his appearance in the Disney film ''Fantasia'' with that orchestra. He was especially noted for his free-hand conducting style that spurned the traditional baton and for obtaining a characteristically sumptuous sound from the orchestras he directed. Stokowski was music director of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, the Philadelphia Orchestra, the NBC Symphony Orchestra, New York Philharmonic Symphony Orchestra, the Houston Symphony Orchestra, the Symphony of the Air and many others. He was also the founder of the All-American Youth Orchestra, the New York City Symphony, the Hollywood Bowl Symphony Orchestra and the American Symphony Orchestra. Stokowski conducted the music for and appeared in several Hollywood films, most notably Disney's ' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wanamaker Organ
The Wanamaker Grand Court Organ, located in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania (United States of America) is the largest fully-functioning pipe organ in the world, based on the number of playing pipes, the number of ranks and its weight. (The Boardwalk Hall Auditorium Organ has more pipes but fewer ranks). The Wanamaker Organ is located within a spacious 7-story Grand Court at Macy's Center City (formerly Wanamaker's department store) and is played twice a day Monday through Saturday. The organ is featured at several special concerts held throughout the year, including events featuring the Friends of the Wanamaker Organ Festival Chorus and Brass Ensemble. Notable characteristics The Wanamaker Organ is a concert organ of the American Symphonic school of design, which combines traditional organ tone with the sonic colors of the symphony orchestra. In its present configuration, the instrument has 28,750 pipes in 464 ranks. The organ console consists of six manuals with an array of st ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Wanamaker's
John Wanamaker Department Store was one of the first department stores in the United States. Founded by John Wanamaker in Philadelphia, it was influential in the development of the retail industry including as the first store to use price tags. At its zenith in the early 20th century, Wanamaker's also had a store in New York City at Broadway and Ninth Street. Both employed extremely large staffs. By the end of the 20th century, there were 16 Wanamaker's outlets, but after years of change the chain was bought by Albert Taubman, and added to his previous purchase of Woodward & Lothrop, the Washington, D.C., department store. In 1994, Woodies, as it was known, filed for bankruptcy. The assets of Woodies were purchased by the May Company Department Stores and JCPenney. In 1995, Wanamaker's transitioned to Hecht's, one of the May Company brands. In 2006, Macy's Center City became the occupant of the former Philadelphia Wanamaker's Department Store, which is now a National Historic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rodman Wanamaker
Lewis Rodman Wanamaker (February 13, 1863 – March 9, 1928) was an American businessman and heir to the Wanamaker's department store fortune. In addition to operating stores in Philadelphia, New York City, and Paris, he was a patron of the arts, of education, of golf and athletics, of Native American scholarship, and of early aviation. He served as a presidential elector for Pennsylvania in 1916, and was appointed Special Deputy Police Commissioner of New York City under Richard Enright in February 1918. In this capacity, he founded the world's first police aviation unit and oversaw reorganization of the New York City Reserve Police Force. In 1916, Wanamaker originated the proposal for the Professional Golfers' Association of America. Biography Wanamaker was born on February 13, 1863, in Philadelphia to John Wanamaker and Mary Erringer Brown. Wanamaker entered Princeton University in 1881, graduating in 1886. In college, he sang in the choir, and was a member and business ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Olivier Latry
Olivier Jean-Claude Latry (born 22 February 1962) is a French organist, improviser, and composer. He is professor of organ in the Conservatoire de Paris. He became interested in the organ after listening to recordings by Pierre Cochereau. His first experience with a church organ was in 1974, when he played the organ at his local church at his older brother's wedding. During the homily, his arms supposedly fell on the organ console, causing a rather dissonant noise in the church. Latry was born in Boulogne-sur-Mer, the youngest of three children (Christian, Jean-Yves, Olivier) born to Robert Latry and Andrée Thomas. After having begun his musical studies in his hometown, in 1978 he enrolled in the organ class under the blind organist Gaston Litaize at the Academy of Saint-Maur who he heard in concert, and took composition classes with Jean-Claude Raynaud at the Paris Academy. Both studied under Marcel Dupré. After becoming Professor of Organ in the Catholic Institute of Pa ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Diane Meredith Belcher
Diane Meredith Belcher is an American concert organist, teacher, and church musician. She has given a large number of solo recitals throughout the United States and abroad, is a teacher, and serves as Music Director at Saint Thomas Episcopal Church, and Lecturer in Music Theory & Organ at Dartmouth College, both in Hanover, New Hampshire. Her concert career is managed by Karen McFarlane Artists, Inc. Education Diane Meredith Belcher earned the degree of Bachelor of Music in 1982 from the Curtis Institute of Music, and the degree of Master of Music in 1983 from the Eastman School of Music. Her teachers include David Spicer, John Weaver, Clarence Watters, David Craighead, and Wilma Jensen (organ); Ford Lallerstedt (music theory, counterpoint and keyboard studies); Edward Aldwell and David Beach (music theory). Career Belcher made her solo recital debut at age 15 at The Wayne Presbyterian Church in Wayne, Pennsylvania. While a student at Curtis, she was an Assistant Organist ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Michael Murray (organist)
Michael Murray (born March 19, 1943 in Kokomo, Indiana) is an American-born organist and writer. Biography Murray studied at Butler University and the Oberlin College Conservatory of Music, before private study with Marcel Dupré in Paris. (He was the last important student of Dupré, of whom he would later write a biography.) During the 1968–69 performance season, Murray performed the complete organ works of Johann Sebastian Bach in a series of twelve recitals in Cleveland. He later commemorated the 150th birthday of César Franck by playing that composer's complete organ works in 1972. He repeated the cycle for the hundredth anniversary of Franck's death (1990, at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City.) Murray's performances have included nearly every major city in North America, with numerous appearances as a soloist with major orchestras. Critics hailed Murray's rare combination of technique, thoughtfulness, and musical feeling. He has made many record ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Jean Guillou
Jean Victor Arthur Guillou (18 April 1930 – 26 January 2019) was a French composer, organist, pianist, and pedagogue. Titular Organist at Saint Eustache in Paris, from 1963 to 2015, he was widely known as a composer of instrumental and vocal music focused on the organ, as an improviser, and as an adviser to organ builders. For several decades he held regular master classes in Zurich and in Paris. Career Guillou was born in Angers. Following his first studies in piano and organ, he became the organist at the church St. Serge in Angers at the age of 12. He studied at the Paris Conservatoire under Marcel Dupré, Maurice Duruflé and Olivier Messiaen. In 1952, while still studying, Guillou played the premiere of his organ transcription of The Musical Offering by Johann Sebastian Bach at Erskine and American United Church in Montreal, Canada. In 1955, he accepted a position as professor of organ and composition at the Institute of Sacred Music in Lisbon. During this time, he w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alexander Frey
Alexander Frey, KM (SMOM), KStJ, is an American symphony orchestra Conductor (music), conductor, virtuoso organist, pianist, harpsichordist and composer. Frey is in great demand as one of the world's most versatile conductors, and enjoys success in the concert hall and opera house, and in the music of Broadway and Hollywood. Leonard Bernstein referred to him as "a wonderful spirit". In addition to his regular appearances as a conductor on major concert series, Frey is very frequently called upon to replace conductors who have canceled their engagements, often at the last minute, and is known for being able to completely learn entire concert programs virtually overnight and follow with performances of great depth. In January 2008, during an interview broadcast on Radio Cairo while conducting in Egypt, Frey stated that "Music is a peaceful island in a river of sadness." Frey has been described as "a witty, urbane figure whose wide-ranging genius is evident in the immense breadth ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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