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New Philharmonic Society
The New Philharmonic Society was a British music society, established in 1852, giving annual series of subscription concerts of orchestral music in London until 1879. The concerts in the first season were conducted by Hector Berlioz. History Prospectus The prospectus of the Society, for the first season of six concerts, was written by its secretary Thomas Willert Beale in January 1852 (referring to "an elder institution" – the existing Philharmonic Society): It is proposed, not only to extend a knowledge of the productions of the greatest masters, by a more perfect performance of their works than has hitherto been attained, but likewise to give to modern and native Composers a favourable opportunity for establishing the worth of their claims upon the attention and esteem of a discerning public.... Exclusiveness, the baneful hindrance to all progress of Art, will not be tolerated in this Society.... The New Philharmonic Society does not entertain the opinion acted upon by an elder ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Exeter Hall
Exeter Hall was a large public meeting place on the north side of the Strand in central London, opposite where the Savoy Hotel now stands. From 1831 until 1907 Exeter Hall was the venue for many great gatherings by promoters of human betterment, most notably the anti-slavery movement. History London in the 19th century was the most populous city in the world, and yet its indoor meeting places were inadequate. The largest, the Freemasons' Hall, could only fit about 1600 people, so a consortium decided that it was time to build a larger venue. Exeter Hall was erected between 1829 and 1831 to designs by John Peter Gandy, the brother of the visionary architect Joseph Michael Gandy. The hall was built on the site of Exeter Exchange, which had been famous for its menagerie of wild animals; prior to the Exeter 'Change, as it was known, the site had been occupied since the 16th century by part of Exeter House (formerly Burghley House and Cecil House), the London residence of the Ea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Edouard Silas
Edouard Silas (22 August 18278 February 1909) who was born in Amsterdam and died in London, was a Dutch composer and organist. He studied in Paris with Friedrich Kalkbrenner, François Benoist and Jacques Fromental Halévy. He lived in London from 1850. Silas was organist at the Catholic Chapel of Kingston upon Thames and Professor of Harmony at the Guildhall School of Music. He was a composer of symphonies, piano concertos, string quartets and organ works. The Symphony in A, Op. 19 was first performed in 1863 and repeated the following year at the Crystal Palace. Other orchestral works include a Piano Concerto in D minor and two other works for piano and orchestra: ''Fantasia'' (performed at the Crystal Palace in 1865) and ''Elegie'' (performed 1873). He composed a Mass for four voices and organ for which he won a Belgian competition for sacred music in 1866. The oratorio ''Joash'' was given at the Norwich Festival in 1873. There are also many solo piano pieces, the best known o ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peter Josef Von Lindpaintner
Peter Josef von Lindpaintner (8 December 1791 – 21 August 1856) was a German composer and conductor. Born in Koblenz as the son of a tenor, he studied with Peter Winter and Joseph Graetz. From 1819 onwards he was based in Stuttgart. Some of his early operas were Singspiele, but under the influence of Carl Maria von Weber his interest shifted to Romantic opera. He died in Nonnenhorn, Bavaria, on Lake Constance. Works Operas Bibliography * R. Hänsler: ''Peter Lindpaintner als Opernkomponist'' (diss., Munich, 1928) * R. Nägele: ''Peter Joseph von Lindpaintner: sein Leben, sein Werk'' (Tutzing, 1993) * R. Nägele: ''Peter von Lindpaintner – Briefe'' (letters, 1809–1856) (Göttingen, 2001) References * Clive Brown: "Lindpaintner, Peter Josef von", in ''The New Grove Dictionary of Opera ''The New Grove Dictionary of Opera'' is an encyclopedia of opera, considered to be one of the best general reference sources on the subject. It is the largest work on opera in Eng ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Henry Wylde
Henry Wylde (22 May 1822 – 13 March 1890) was an English conductor, composer, teacher and music critic. Background Henry Wylde was born at Bushey, Hertfordshire, elder son of Henry Wylde (1795–1876) and Martha Lucy née Paxton. His father, then the organist at St. Mary's Church, Watford, was himself a music teacher. Henry, the father, one of the Children of the Chapel Royal was for many years vicar choral of the Chapels Royal and cantor there and he was a soloist at the marriage of Queen Victoria. Young Henry's mother's Durham based Paxton family included the 18th century musicians Stephen Paxton (c.1734–1787) and his elder brother William Paxton (1725–1778). Both, originally cathedral choristers, became cellists and composers. William remained based in Durham but the better-known Stephen had moved to London by 1756 and the next year was elected a member of the Royal Society of Musicians. Not as well known but also active in London were Frances, a church organis ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Henry Smart
Henry Thomas Smart (26 October 1813 – 6 July 1879) was an English organist and composer. Biography Smart was born in London, a nephew of the conductor Sir George Smart and son of a music publisher, orchestra director and accomplished violinist (also called Henry Smart). His sister was the artist and composer Harriet Anne Smart. He was educated at Highgate School, and then studied for the law, but soon gave this up for music. In 1831, Smart became organist of Blackburn parish church, where he wrote his first important work, an anthem; then of St Giles-without-Cripplegate; St Luke's, Old Street; and finally of St Pancras New Church, in 1864, which last post he held at the time of his death, less than a month after receiving a government pension of £100 per annum. Smart was also skilled as a mechanic, and designed several organs. He was also invited by William Sterndale Bennett to join the Committee of his Bach Society leading to the first English performance of Bach's ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
La Vestale (Spontini)
''La vestale'' (''The Vestal Virgin'') is an opera composed by Gaspare Spontini to a French libretto by Étienne de Jouy. It takes the form of a ''tragédie lyrique'' in three acts. It was first performed on 15 December 1807 by the Académie Impériale de Musique ( Paris Opera) at the Salle Montansier and is regarded as Spontini's masterpiece. The musical style shows the influence of Gluck and anticipates the works of Berlioz, Wagner, and French Grand opera. Composition history Spontini had finished ''La vestale'' by the summer of 1805 but had faced opposition from leading members of the Opéra and rivalry from fellow composers.Del Teatro The premiere was made possible with the help of Spontini's patron, the Empress Joséphine, but only after being rearranged by Jean-Baptiste Rey and Louis-Luc Loiseau de Persuis. ''La vestale'' was an enormous success, enjoying over two hundred performances by 1830. Performance history Its fame soon spread abroad; it appeared in Naples and in V ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Spontini
Gaspare Luigi Pacifico Spontini (14 November 177424 January 1851) was an Italian opera composer and conductor from the classical era. Biography Born in Maiolati, Papal State (now Maiolati Spontini, Province of Ancona), he spent most of his career in Paris and Berlin, but returned to his place of birth at the end of his life. During the first two decades of the 19th century, Spontini was an important figure in French ''opera''. In his more than twenty operas, Spontini strove to adapt Gluck's classical ''tragédie lyrique'' to the contemporary taste for melodrama, for grander spectacle (in ''Fernand Cortez'' for example), for enriched orchestral timbre, and for melodic invention allied to idiomatic expressiveness of words. As a youth, Spontini studied at the Conservatorio della Pietà de' Turchini, one of four active music conservatories of Naples. Working his way from Italian city to city, he got his first break in Rome, with his successful comedy ''Li Puntigli delle Donne'' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
St Martin's Hall
The Queen's Theatre in London was established in 1867 as a theatre on the site of St Martin's Hall, a large concert room that had opened in 1850. It stood on the corner of Long Acre (formerly Charles Street) and Endell Street, with entrances in Wilson Street and Long Acre. The site is within the modern Camden, part of Covent Garden.Walter Thornbury ''Old and New London: A Narrative of its History, its People and its Places. Illustrated with Numerous Engravings from the Most Authentic Sources.: Volume 3'' accessed 1 April 2008 St Martin's Hall contained a 3,000-seat main hall and a 500-seat lecture hall. It was used for musica ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gioachino Rossini
Gioachino Antonio Rossini (29 February 1792 – 13 November 1868) was an Italian composer who gained fame for his 39 operas, although he also wrote many songs, some chamber music and piano pieces, and some sacred music. He set new standards for both comic and serious opera before retiring from large-scale composition while still in his thirties, at the height of his popularity. Born in Pesaro to parents who were both musicians (his father a trumpeter, his mother a singer), Rossini began to compose by the age of 12 and was educated at music school in Bologna. His first opera was performed in Venice in 1810 when he was 18 years old. In 1815 he was engaged to write operas and manage theatres in Naples. In the period 1810–1823 he wrote 34 operas for the Italian stage that were performed in Venice, Milan, Ferrara, Naples and elsewhere; this productivity necessitated an almost formulaic approach for some components (such as overtures) and a certain amount of self-borrowing. During ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
William Tell (opera)
''William Tell'' (french: Guillaume Tell, link=no; it, Guglielmo Tell, link=no) is a French-language opera in four acts by Italian composer Gioachino Rossini to a libretto by Victor-Joseph Étienne de Jouy and L. F. Bis, based on Friedrich Schiller's play ''Wilhelm Tell,'' which, in turn, drew on the William Tell legend. The opera was Rossini's last, although he lived for nearly 40 more years. Fabio Luisi said that Rossini planned for ''Guillaume Tell'' to be his last opera even as he composed it. The often-performed overture in four sections features a depiction of a storm and a vivacious finale, the "March of the Swiss Soldiers". Paris Opéra archivist Charles Malherbe discovered the original orchestral score of the opera at a secondhand book seller's shop, resulting in its being acquired by the Paris Conservatoire. Performance history ''Guillaume Tell'' was first performed by the Paris Opéra at the Salle Le Peletier on 3 August 1829, but within three performances cuts we ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Charles Lockey
Charles Lockey (20 March 1820 – 3 December 1901) was an English singer. A tenor, he is known particularly as a soloist in the first performance of Mendelssohn's oratorio '' Elijah''. Life He was born in Thatcham in Berkshire, on 20 March 1820, son of Angel Lockey of Oxford. He was a choirboy at Magdalen College, Oxford, from 1828 to 1836, and afterwards studied singing with Edward Harris at Bath; in 1842 he was a pupil of Sir George Smart. Lockey sang in the choirs of St George's Chapel, Windsor, and Eton College Chapel. In 1843 he became a vicar-choral of St Paul's Cathedral. His first public appearance in oratorio was in October 1842, when he sang in Rossini's ''Stabat Mater'' for the Melophonic Society. In 1848 he was appointed a Gentleman of the Chapel Royal. He performed at the Concerts of Antient Music in 1846; he also sang at concerts of the Three Choirs Festival and the Sacred Harmonic Society. In 1846 Lockey was engaged for the Birmingham Festival: in the first per ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Charlotte Dolby
Charlotte Helen Sainton-Dolby (17 May 182118 February 1885), was an English contralto, singing teacher and composer. Life Charlotte Helen Dolby was born in London to Samuel Dolby and Charlotte Niven. Her father died when she was 10 years old. She studied at the Royal Academy of Music from 1832 to 1837, Domenico Crivelli being her principal singing-master. In 1837 she was elected to a King's scholarship, and first appeared at a Royal Philharmonic Society concert in 1841. In October 1845 she sang at the Gewandhaus, Leipzig, through the influence of Mendelssohn, who had been delighted by her singing in his oratorio ''St. Paul''. The contralto music in his '' Elijah'' was written for her voice, but she did not appear in that work until the performance at Exeter Hall on 16 April 1847. She was a principal soloist in the first English performance of Bach's ''St Matthew Passion'', directed by William Sterndale Bennett at the Hanover Square Rooms London on 6 April 1854 and again for ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
