Composers with last names beginning with A, B, C, D, E, F, or G listed here include:
Bach, Johann Sebastian (1685-1750)
Bach was born on March 21, 1685, in Eisenach, Thüringen, into a musical family with a lot of musicians. He studied music, first with his father, then with his brother. In 1700 Bach began to earn his own living first as a chorister, then became a violinist, and then a church organist. In 1707 he married a second cousin, Maria Barbara Bach, and went to work as an organist in a church. The next year he started to work as organist and violinist at the court of Duke Wilhelm Ernst and remained there for the next nine years, becoming concertmaster of the court orchestra in 1714. He composed about 30 cantatas, and also wrote organ and harpsichord works. He began to travel throughout Germany as an organ virtuoso and as a consultant to organ builders.
In 1717 Bach began a 6-year employment as chapelmaster and director of chamber music at the court of Prince Leopold of Anhalt-Köthen. During this period he wrote primarily secular music for ensembles and solo instruments. He also prepared music books for his wife and children, with the purpose of teaching them keyboard technique and musicianship. These books include the Well-Tempered Clavier, the Inventions, and the Little Organ Book. Bach's first wife died in 1720, and the next year he married Anna Magdalena Wilcken, a fine singer and daughter of a court musician. She bore him 13 children in addition to the 7 he had had by his first wife, and she helped him in his work by copying the scores of his music for the performers.
Bach moved to Leipzig in 1723 and spent the rest of his life there. No one appreciated his genius. Nevertheless, he continued to compose music, and produced a lot of works, among these works are the Ascension Cantata and the Christmas Oratorio, the latter consisting of six cantatas. The St. John Passion and the St. Matthew Passion also were written in Leipzig, as was the epic Mass in B Minor. Among the works written for the keyboard during this period are the famous Goldberg Variations; Part II of the Well-Tempered Clavier; and the Art of the Fugue, Bach's eyesight began to fail in the last year of his life, and he died on July 28, 1750, after undergoing an unsuccessful eye operation.
For the next 80 years after his death his music was neglected by the public, although a few musicians admired it, among them Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Ludwig van Beethoven. A revival of interest in Bach's music occurred in the mid-19th century. The German composer Felix Mendelssohn arranged a performance of the St. Matthew Passion in 1829, which did much to awaken popular interest in Bach.
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Bela Bartok (1881 - 1945)
Hungary's most famous composer was actually born in a town now part of Romania. He got a lot of his inspiration from his travels around his native rural areas in the early 1900s, recording folk music on a phonograph.
And no, there was nothing wrong with it: those Transylvanian melodies really do use many of the 'wrong' notes, 'wrong' rhythms and 'wrong' chords which characterise so much of Bartók's music.
His character could be just as difficult as some of his tunes, and his uncompromising demands from often generous sponsors in America made his financial position even more precarious than it might be.
He died in great pain of leukaemia in New York having just completed his popular, and not so difficult, Concerto for Orchestra. His equally accessible Piano Concerto No. 3, with its deeply comforting and tranquil slow movement, was left 17 bars short of completion.
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Beethoven, Ludwig van (1770-1827)
Beethoven was born in Bonn. His father's harsh discipline and alcoholism made his childhood and adolescence difficult. Beethoven studied music with some of the greatest composers, including Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart and Joseph Haydn. The combination of forceful, dramatic power with dreamy introspection in Beethoven's music made a strong impression in Viennese aristocratic circles and helped win him generous patrons. Yet just as his success seemed assured, he was confronted with the loss of that sense on which he so depended, his hearing. This impairment gradually put an end to his performing career. Still, he wrote a number of famous works, including the Symphony No. 3 in E-flat major op. 55 (the Eroica, completed 1804), Fidelio, and the Symphony No. 5 in C minor op. 67 (1808).
Beethoven's fame during his lifetime reached its peak in 1814. The enthusiastic response of the public to his music at this time was focused on showy works, such as Wellington's Victory op. 91 (1813; also known as the Battle Symphony), and the cantata The Glorious Moment op. 136 (1814), but his enhanced popularity also made possible the successful revival of Fidelio.
During the last decade of his life Beethoven had almost completely lost his hearing, and he was increasingly socially isolated. Between 1818 and 1826 Beethoven wrote a series of ambitious large-scale compositions, including the Missa Solemnis in D major op. 123 (1823), the Thirty-Three Variations on a Waltz by Diabelli in C major op. 120 (1823), and the Symphony No. 9 in D minor op. 125 (1824). Plagued at times by serious illness, Beethoven nevertheless maintained his sense of humor and often amused himself with jokes and puns. He continued to work at a high level of creativity until he contracted pneumonia in December 1826. He died in Vienna in March 1827.
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Johannes Brahms (1833-1897)
Johannes Brahms was never totally successful in his goal, that was to be as universal as Beethoven, and perhaps this accounted for his pessimistic outlook on life. He tried to combine the richness of the
romantic spirit with the discipline of classicism. As a Romantic he was drawn to the smaller musical forms, but as a Classicist he longed for the great art of the German past.
Brahms was born on 7th May 1833 in Hamburg, Germany. His father had broken with family tradition (his forebears had been farmers, entrepreneurs and artisans) and had studied music. Thus he detected early on his son's musical talent. The young Johannes was a dreamer and literature was a big part of his world. At the age of fifteen he began to compose music secretly, and at eighteen he started composing piano works which shoed a strength combined with tenderness.
In 1853, he met Robert Schumann, Brahms' friendship with Schumann and his wife Clara was deep and enduring. Schumann helped this couple a lot.
From 1857 to 1859 Brahms was a music teacher and conductor at the Detmold Court. During this time he wrote choral music most notably his German Requim. In 1862 he decided to go to Vienna to make a name for himself. He soon received a critical acclaim as a piano virtuoso. During his first years in Vienna he also produced some of his best-known works. He wrote the D-minor piano concerto and many lieder (songs).
Years later, in 1889, Brahms became very ill. In 1896, however his face took on a yellow colour. The doctors diagnosed cancer of the liver, but he was led to believe he had scurvy. The once stout man was now a skeleton.
On 3rd April, 1897 he died, leaving classical music the richer because of his genius.
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Chopin, Frédéric François (1810-1849),
Polish composer and pianist of the romantic school, regarded by some as the greatest of all composers of music for the piano. Born Fryderyk Chopin near Warsaw, he preferred to use the French name Frédéric. He began to study the piano at the age of four, and when he was eight years old he played at a private concert in Warsaw. Later he studied harmony and counterpoint at the Warsaw Conservatory.
Chopin was also precocious as a composer: His first published composition is dated 1817. He gave his first concerts as a piano virtuoso in 1829 in Vienna, where he lived for the next two years. After 1831, except for brief absences, Chopin lived in Paris, where he became noted as a pianist, teacher, and composer. In 1838 Chopin began to suffer from tuberculosis and went to the Balearic Islands. Thereafter his musical activity was limited to giving several concerts in 1848 in France, Scotland, and England. He died in Paris of tuberculosis.
Nearly all of Chopin's compositions are for piano. He was deeply loyal to his war-torn homeland; his mazurkas reflect the rhythms and melodic traits of Polish folk music, and his polonaises are marked by a heroic spirit. His ballades, scherzos, and études exemplify his large-scale works for solo piano. His music, romantic and lyrical in nature, is characterized by exquisite melody of great originality, refined-often adventurous-harmony, subtle rhythm, and poetic beauty. Chopin greatly influenced other composers, notably the Hungarian pianist and composer Franz Liszt, German composer Richard Wagner, and French composer Claude Debussy. Chopin's many published compositions include 55 mazurkas, 27 études, 24 preludes, 19 nocturnes, 13 polonaises, and 3 piano sonatas. Among his other works are the Concertos in E minor and in F minor, both for piano and orchestra, the cello concerto, and 17 songs.
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Claude Debussy (1862-1918)
Claude Debussy was the founder of Impressionist School of Music. Like the Impressionist painters Monet and Renoir who were preoccupied with tone. He rejected the dramatic, the formal, the conventional. Thus, Debussy's music, was in many ways a rejection of both Classicism and Romanticism.
Debussy was born in St. German-en-Laye, France on August 22, 1862. His father had been a soldier, but wanted his son to become a sailor. His musical talent was discovered by Antoinette Maute, the mother-in-law of the poet Verlaine. He entered the Paris Conservatory in 1872, where he remained for twelve years.
In 1909 Debussy discovered that he was suffering from cancer. Nevertheless, during the following four years, he composed some of his finest works. Most notable are the 24 preludes and 12 Etudes for piano and the music for Games.
Debussy finally succumbed to his illness on March 25, 1918. With his death the world lost its first - and perhaps last - great Impressionist composer. His significance lies in this freeing music from the strictures of classical form. He believed that "[music] should seem not to have been written down."
Claude Debussy was the founder of Impressionist School of Music. Like the Impressionist painters Monet and Renoir who were preoccupied with tone. He rejected the dramatic, the formal, the conventional. Thus, Debussy's music, was in many ways a rejection of both Classicism and Romanticism.
Debussy was born in St. German-en-Laye, France on August 22, 1862. His father had been a soldier, but wanted his son to become a sailor. His musical talent was discovered by Antoinette Maute, the mother-in-law of the poet Verlaine. He entered the Paris Conservatory in 1872, where he remained for twelve years.
In 1909 Debussy discovered that he was suffering from cancer. Nevertheless, during the following four years, he composed some of his finest works. Most notable are the 24 preludes and 12 Etudes for piano and the music for Games.
Debussy finally succumbed to his illness on March 25, 1918. With his death the world lost its first - and perhaps last - great Impressionist composer. His significance lies in this freeing music from the strictures of classical form. He believed that "[music] should seem not to have been written down."
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Antonin Dvorak (1841-1904)
A towering figure in instrumental music and a capable Czech viola player. Antonin Dvorak, born on the 8th September in the year 1841,in Nelahozeves. Dvorak studied in the Prague Organ School. He joined the new Provisional Theatre Orchestra.
He taught privately and mainly composed from the year 1873. Thrice, Dvorak won the austrian State Stipendium which attracted the attention of the famous music master, Brahms. From then a friendship grew between the two composers.
Dvorak was very successful in perform in foreign lands, some of his most famous performances are Slavonic Dances, the Sixth Symphony and the Stabat mater. These performances brought along even more commissions abroad.
Dvorak's performance were particularly well received in England. Later Dvorak wrote The Spectre's Bride (1884) and the Requiem Mass (1890) for Birmingham, the Seventh Symphony for the Philharmonic Society (1885) and St. Ludmilla for Leeds (1886). There in England Antonin Dvorak also received a doctorate from Cambridge University.
Dvorak toured to Bohemia and then went to new York. there he taught composition as director of the national Conservatory.
there, he wrote the world famous Ninth Symphony the string quartet in F and the string Quintet in E Flat.
Because of financial and family reasons Dvorak went back to Prague. There Dvorak produced a successful dramatic music, the fairytale opera Rusalka.
This Czech composer received loads of awards and honours all his life. His most applausible works were his instrumental pieces which were exceptionally outstanding.
Antonin Dvorak, a loyal Czech all his life passed away on the 1st May 1904 in Prague.
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