“It is cruel, you know, that music should be so beautiful.  It has the beauty of loneliness and of pain: of strength and freedom.  The beauty of disappointment and never-satisfied love.  The cruel beauty of nature, and everlasting beauty of monotony.” Benjamin Britten

Title: Gymnopedies No. 1 Composer: Eric Satie Arranger: Greg Smith Instrumentation: Cello quartet Product medium: PDF score and parts Sample:    

There is, behind the soul and the whole life of the artist, perhaps a suffering soul … The moment one day will come in which perhaps yourself – if you possess a soul as I wish to believe – you will be able to see through feeling without any explanation. – Dimitri Mitropoulos to Leonard […]

in 1862, Brahms called to see Julius Epstein, a professor at the Vienna Conservatory. “Joachim tells me – ha! – that you have written some really interesting music. Sent me your piano sonata in F minor to look over. Bring any new compositions with you?” he added, noticing Johanne’s portfolio. “I have two piano quartets […]

At a concert in London in December 1911, Rachmaninoff was received to great acclaim: perhaps a little too much from the orchestra's view point, who wanted to play the rest of their program: The London Philharmonic Concert given on November 7, provided an object lesson in this study of the relation of applause to encores.  […]

When Brahms was young, he had to play in rowdy taverns to help support his family. Dance music was what the people in the taverns wanted, and Hannes would sometimes relieve the monotony by improvising variations on the popular waltzes of the day.  But what finally made his work endurable was the discovery that while […]

Leopold Stokowski conducted the American premier of Berg’s opera Wozzeck in 1930 (a joint effort of The Philadelphia Orchestra, the Phildelphia Grand Opera, and Curtis Institute).  Abram Chasins recalls a rehearsal: I attended his second rehearsal with the orchestra in the pit and singers on the stage.  After some twenty minutes of singing and acting, […]

Every day one should at least hear one little song, read one good poem, see one fine painting and–if at all possible–speak a few sensible words. — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Goethe, Johann (translated by Frederick Ungar & Heinz Goethe, Johann W., Frederick Ungar, and Heinz Norden). Goethe’s world view : presented in his reflections […]

Franz Xaver Schnyder von Wartensee (1786-1868) was a composer who wanted lessons with Beethoven.  Beethoven would only look at his compositions. Schnyder often dined in the Mehlgrube, because he knew that Beethoven often went there at the same time in the evening. One lovely spring night Schnyder, on entering the restaurant, saw his friend Beethoven […]

We must always work, and a self-respecting artist must not fold his hands on the pretext that he is not in the mood. If we wait for the mood, without endeavouring to meet it half-way, we easily become indolent and apathetic. We must be patient, and believe that inspiration will come to those who can […]