Klaus Döring's Classical Music/Klaus Döring's Klassische Musik

by  Maureen Buja  Three of Rossini’s operas mark turning points in his development as an opera composer.  Semiramide ,  Guillaume Tell , and  La gazza ladra  (The Thieving Magpie) each gather up a summary of his operatic development to that point and are made into very long operas. They also share another characteristic: none of these operas show the self-borrowing that marks much of his work.  Semiramide  is the culmination of his  opera seria  work and is the turning point in his withdrawal from Italian operatic life.  Guillaume Tell  is the end of the series of his operas written in Naples and then Paris, which were about experimentation and exploration – this is his farewell to his career in the theatre.  La gazza ladra , with its mix of serious and comic elements, is his last experiment in comic opera. His next area was the musical farce ( farse ), starting with  L’Italiana in Algeri , where his operas calle...

By Georg Predota , Interlude Composers tend to be a peculiar lot, particularly as it pertains to the best and most conducive circumstances in which they compose their best music. Of course, reports of that nature tend to be highly anecdotal, but more often then not, they do contain at least a kernel of truth. Ludwig van Beethoven Beethoven on a Walk by Berthold Genzmer As the American painter, artist and photographer Chuck Close famously stated, “Amateurs sit and wait for inspiration, the rest of us just show up and go to work.”  Beethoven , for example, went for vigorous walks through the forests and hills surrounding Vienna after lunch. He always carried with him a pencil and a small pocket sketchbook, recording any musical ideas that would thus come to his mind. Gustav Mahler Mahler’s Komponierhäuschen Gustav Mahler  not only locked himself in various Komponierhäuschen (Composer’s cottages), he also took 3 to 4-hour walks after lunch, recording his musical impressions in a ...