The Lark Ascending is a short, single-movement work by the English composer Ralph Vaughan Williams, inspired by the 1881 poem of the same name by the English writer George Meredith. It was originally for violin and piano, completed in 1914, but not performed until 1920. The composer reworked it for solo violin and orchestra after […]
Rémi Geffroy
Accordionist and composer Rémi Geffroy is a curious and multifaceted musician. Drawing on diverse influences, he creates his own style, blending traditional, classical, and jazz music. Born in Toulouse in 1987, he was immersed in traditional music throughout his childhood. With a grandfather who played the harmonica and a grandmother who led a folk group […]
Chopin – Fantaisie-Impromptu in C♯ minor,
Frédéric Chopin’s Fantaisie-Impromptu in C♯ minor, Op. posth. 66, WN 46 is a solo piano composition. It was composed in 1834 and published posthumously in 1855 despite Chopin’s instruction that none of his unpublished manuscripts be published. The Fantaisie-Impromptu is one of Chopin’s most frequently performed and popular compositions. The Fantaisie-Impromptu was written in 1834, as were […]
Bach – Der Himmel Lacht! Die Erde Jubilieret (Heaven Laughs! Earth Exults)
Der Himmel lacht! Die Erde jubilieret (Heaven laughs! Earth exults), BWV 31, is a church cantata by Johann Sebastian Bach for the first day of Easter. Bach composed the cantata in Weimar and first performed it on 21 April 1715. On 2 March 1714 Bach was appointed concert master of the Weimar court kapelle of the […]
Hildegard of Bingen (Music)
Hildegard of Bingen OSB (c. 1098 – 17 September 1179), also known as the Sibyl of the Rhine, was a German Benedictine abbess and polymath active as a writer, composer, philosopher, mystic, visionary, and as a medical writer and practitioner during the High Middle Ages. She is one of the best-known composers of sacred monophony, as well […]
Wagner – The Ride of the Valkyries
The Ride of the Valkyries is the popular name of the prelude to the first scene of the third and last act of Die Walküre, the second of the four epic music dramas that constitute the operatic cycle Der Ring des Nibelungen (English: The Ring of the Nibelung), composed by Richard Wagner. As a separate […]
Beethoven – Piano Sonata No. 23 ‘Appassionata’
Ludwig van Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 23 in F minor, Op. 57 (colloquially known as the Appassionata, meaning “passionate” in Italian) is among the three famous piano sonatas of his middle period; it was composed during 1804 and 1805, and perhaps 1806, and Beethoven dedicated it to cellist and his friend, Count Franz Brunswick. The […]