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

Born on January 4, 1710 in Ancona/Italy, Giovanni Battista Pergolesi passed away in Pozzuoli/Italy on March 16, 1736. He became pupil of Francesco Durante (1648-1755) in Naples. Pergolesi's intermezzi did impress much. Only the intermezzo "La Serva Padrona" (1736) became his most famous work. This comic opera ("The maid as mistress") has been performed up to today. It became the oldest and alive as well as vivid opera. Still six concertinos can be found on rare available records. Pergolesi's instrumental music pleases us especially because of its "Singing Allegros" - by the way, it impressed also and especially Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach (1714-1788) and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756-1791). Pergolesi's last work has been a "Stabat Mater", a sequence of catholic liturgy. It became one of the best church music works from Naples. Pergolesi's talent to change simple folksongs into artistic musical objects let became...

Giacomo Meyerbeer was born on September 5, 1791 in Berlin and passed away on May 2, 1864 in Paris. His real name was Jakob Liebermann Beer. "Meyer" has been added to his family name to take possession of a big inheritance. Meyerbeer, a rich banker's son, was a really music genius. Muzio Clementi (1752-1832) and Karl-Friedrich Zelter (1758-1832) have been his well-known teachers. Meyerbeers first opera (when he celebrated his 22nd birthday!) became a flop . He tried to survive as a pianist. Fox six years, he wasn't able to compose ven a single piece. Only after moving to Paris and adopting the French opera-style, Meyerbeer held the field. His operas consisted of emotive and sometimes histrionic terms together with big choirs and acts: "Robert, the devil" (1831), "The Hugenots" (1836), "The Prophet" (1849) and "The African" (1838). Meyerbeer seems to be forgotten up tp now because many attempts to restore his compistions have bee...

Born: April 30, 1870 Komarom Hungary Died: October 24, 1948 (aged 78) Bad Ischl Austria Notable Works: “The Merry Widow” Franz Lehár, (born April 30, 1870, Komárom, Hung., Austria-Hungary—died Oct. 24, 1948, Bad Ischl, Austria), Hungarian composer of operettas who achieved worldwide success with Die lustige Witwe (The Merry Widow). He studied at the Prague Conservatory. Encouraged by Antonín Dvořák to follow a musical career, Lehár traveled in Austria as a bandmaster from 1890. In 1896 he produced his operetta Kukuschka. In The Merry Widow (1905), with libretto by Viktor Léon and Leo Stein, Lehár created a new style of Viennese operetta, introducing waltz tunes and imitations of the Parisian cancan dances as well as a certain satirical element. Its success was such that two years later it was played at Buenos Aires at five theatres simultaneously. Many other operettas by Lehár followed and became well known in England and the United States under their English titles. Among them were Th...