Royal Toy Theatre BLOG: 2009

Thursday, July 16, 2009

Listen: Halka - Overture

Listen: Halka - Overture [ composer: STANISŁAW MONIUSZKO ]

Stanisław Moniuszko (born May 5, 1819 in Ubiel near Minsk - June 4, 1872 in Warsaw, Congress Poland) was a Polish composer, conductor and teacher. His output includes many songs and operas, and his musical style is filled with patriotic Polish folk themes. He is generally referred to as the father of Polish national opera.

Listen: Fidelio - Overture

Listen: Fidelio - Overture [BEETHOVEN]

Ludwig van Beethoven (17 December 1770 – 26 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. He was a crucial figure in the transitional period between the classical and romantic eras in Western classical music, and remains one of the most acclaimed and influential composers of all time.

Born in Bonn, which was then in the Electorate of Cologne in present-day western Germany, he moved to Vienna in his early twenties and settled there, studying with Joseph Haydn and quickly gaining a reputation as a virtuoso pianist. His hearing began to deteriorate in the late 1790s, yet he continued to compose, and to conduct and perform, even after becoming completely deaf.

The Ride of the Valkyries

Listen to Wagner's most famous "Ride", The Ride of the Valkyries

Richard Wagner (22 May 1813, Leipzig, Germany – 13 February 1883, Venice, Italy) was a German composer, conductor, theatre director and essayist, primarily known for his operas (or "music dramas", as they were later called). Unlike most other great opera composers, Wagner wrote both the scenario and libretto for his works.

Wagner's compositions, particularly those of his later period, are notable for contrapuntal texture, rich chromaticism, harmonies and orchestration, and elaborate use of leitmotifs: musical themes associated with particular characters, locales or plot elements. Wagner pioneered advances in musical language, such as extreme chromaticism and quickly shifting tonal centres, which greatly influenced the development of European classical music.

He transformed musical thought through his idea of Gesamtkunstwerk ("total artwork"), the synthesis of all the poetic, visual, musical and dramatic arts, epitomized by his monumental four-opera cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen (1876). To try to stage these works as he imagined them, Wagner built his own opera house, the Bayreuth Festspielhaus.