Music Archives - Page 35 of 36

Élisabeth Sophie Chéron

Although Élisabeth-Sophie Chéron is best remembered today as a painter, she was actually a true Renaissance woman, acclaimed during her lifetime as a talented poet, musician, artist, and academicienne. In her childhood, she was trained by her father in the arts of enamelling and miniature painting. Under the sponsorship of the prominent artist Charles Le Brun, she was admitted to the Académie Royale of Paris as a portrait painter in 1672. She exhibited regularly at the Salon in Paris, while also producing poetry and translations; she was fluent in Hebrew, Greek and Latin. Chéron’s literary talent was recognized in 1694 when she was named a member of Italy’s Accademia dei Ricovrati in Padua, and given the academician name of Erato, after the muse of lyric and love poetry.

Ada Jemima Crossley

Contralto singer Madame Ada Crossley had her professional debut in Sydney in January 1892. Sheleft Australia in March 1894 to study in Europe, after giving farewell concerts in Melbourne, Sydney and Adelaide. In Europe, she studied with Sir Charles Santley in London and later in Paris with Madame Marchesi, and made her London debut at the Queen’s Hall in May 1895. In 1902 and 1903, Crossley toured the United States, recording for the Victor Gramophone Companies Red Seal Celebrity series. She thentoured Australia and New Zealand, returning to England via South Africa (1903-1904) and subsequently returned to Australia for a series of concerts in 1908-1909. During the First World War she sang at benefit concerts, then limited her professional engagements after the war.
Singing in English, German, French, Italian, Norwegian, Danish and Russian, Crossley claimed a repertoire of 500 sacred songs and ballads, ranging from Gluck and Handel to Richard Strauss.

Wanda Landowska

Wanda Aleksandra Landowska was a Polish harpsichordist and pianist whose performances, teaching, writings and especially her many recordings helped revitalize the popularity of the harpsichord in the early 1900s. She was the first person to record Johann Sebastian Bach’s Goldberg Variations on the harpsichord in 1933. She conducted extensive research on all aspects of 17th- and 18th-century music, and published her book Musique ancienne in 1909. Landowska toured throughout Europe performing Bach concertos on harpsichord; these concerts, combined with her research, and writings spurred the 20-century revival of the instrument and the development of modern harpsichord technique. Landowska also taught classes at conservatories in Berlin and Paris, and in 1925 founded her own school, the École de Musique Ancienne (School of Ancient Music), north of Paris at Saint-Leu-la-Fôret. In 1940, she and her domestic partner, Denise Restout, fled the Nazi invasion of France. Her home in Saint-Leu was looted, and her instruments and manuscripts stolen, so she arrived in the United States essentially with no assets. She went on to re-establish herself as a performer and teacher in the United States, touring extensively. After her death in 1959, her longtime domestic partner Restout edited and translated her writings and music, preserving Landowska’s artistic legacy.

Zelia N. Breaux

Zelia N. Breaux was an American music teacher and musician who played the trumpet, violin and piano. She organized the first music department at Oklahoma’s Langston University, as well as the school’s first orchestra. As the Supervisor of Music for segregated African-American schools in Oklahoma City, Breaux organized bands, choral groups and orchestras, establishing a music teacher in each of the district’s schools. She had a significant influence on many musicians including Charlie Christian and Jimmy Rushing, as well as novelist Ralph Ellison. Breaux was the first woman president of the Oklahoma Association of Negro Teachers and was posthumously inducted into the Oklahoma YWCA Hall of Fame, Oklahoma Women’s Hall of Fame and the Oklahoma Bandmasters Association Hall of Fame.

Gwen Verdon

Gwyneth Evelyn “Gwen” Verdon was an American actor and dancer, who won four Tony Awards for her musical comedy performances, and served as an uncredited choreographer’s assistant and specialty dance coach for theater and film. Known for her bright red hair and a quaver in her voice, Verdon was a celebrated performer on Broadway from the 1950s through the 1970s. Having originated many roles in musicals she is also remembered as the dancer, collaborator and muse for whom her husband director–choreographer Bob Foss choreographed much of his work, and who guarded his legacy after his death.

Mercedes Sosa

Haydée Mercedes Sosa was an Argentine singer popular throughout Latin America and beyond. With roots in Argentine folk music, Sosa became one of the leading proponents of nueva canción, a genre that combines folk styles with social issue messages. Her repertoire including songs written by many Latin American songwriters, and she was called the “voice of the voiceless ones”.
Sosa performed in venues such as the Lincoln Center in New York City, the Théâtre Mogador in Paris and the Sistine Chapel in Vatican City, as well as selling out shows in New York’s Carnegie Hall and the Roman Colosseum during the last decade of her life. Her career spanned more than 40 years and she won six Latin Grammy awards (2000, 2003, 2004, 2006, 2009, 2011), including a Latin Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award in 2004 and two posthumous Latin Grammy Award for Best Folk Album in 2009 and 2011. She won Argentina’s leading music award, the Premio Gardel in 2000. She also served as an ambassador for UNICEF.

Mary Morello

Mary Morello is an American activist who founded anti-censorship group Parents for Rock and Rap in 1987, which earned her the Hugh M. Hefner First Amendment Award in Arts and Entertainment in 1996. In the 1960s, Morello was involved in the US civil rights movement and the NAACP; she is also a long-time activist for the Chicago Urban League. In 1991, Morello began volunteering with the Salvation Army Rehabilitation Center in Waukegan, Illinois, teaching adult literacy. She was involved in the Cuba Coalition in Chicago, which works toward lifting the U.S. embargo against Cuba. Morello is also known for advocating in 1999 on behalf of death row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal, convicted (possibly wrongly) of the 1982 shooting of a Philadelphia police officer. His death sentence was overturned by a Federal court in 2001

Ilma de Murska

Known as “The Croatian Nightingale”, Ilma de Murska was an acclaimed 19th-century soprano opera singer. Her musical style was uninhibited and unrestrained – as she tended to depart from the score in fantastic improvisations, conductors would have to hold back the orchestra’s crescendo until she was ready. The fact that she could get away with this – to lead rather than follow – spoke to the power of her popularity and skill, further endearing her to her audiences.

Yvette Guilbert

Yvette Guilbert was a French cabaret singer and actress of the Belle Époque, who also starred in several early films, from 1919 to 1936. Onstage, she usually dressed in bright yellow with long gloves, standing almost perfectly still, gesturing with her long arms as she sang. Ahead of her time, she favored monologue-style “patter songs” and was frequently billed as a “diseuse” or “sayer”. The lyrics (often her own) were raunchy, and delved into subjects like tragedy, lost love, and the Parisian poverty of her childhood. Guilbert broke and reinvented the rules of music hall performance with her audacious lyrics, and the audiences loved her. She was acclaimed in France, England, and the United Statesin the early 1900s for her songs and imitations of France’s common people.

Sylvia Townsend Warner

Sylvia Townsend Warner was an English musicologist, novelist and poet, known for works such as the novels Lolly Willowes and After the Death of Don Juan, the poetry collection Whether a Dove or a Seagull and several short story collections. She also served in the Red Cross during the Spanish Civil War in the 1930s.