Who are we celebrating in 2021?
mainJosquin des Pres, 500 years since his death
Camille Saint-Saens, Engelbert Humperdinck: 100 years
Igor Stravinsky, 50 years
Alexander Zemlinsky, born 1871
Malcolm Arnold, born 1921
Likewise Aastor Piazolla
Mario Lanza, born 1921
Enrico Caruso, died 1921
Anna Netrebko, Evgeny Kissin, born 50 years ago
Josquin, Saint-Saens, Humperdinck and Zemlinsky: arguably not overperformed.
Stravinsky’s anniversary should hopefully provide opportunities to hear music other than the three famous ballets.
Kissin’s career is solid enough to withstand the slump in media attention: too old to be the latest young hot talent (he was in the 80s and early 90s), too young to be a musical elder statesman (give him another 2-3 decades).
Jacqueline Du Pre, 1945
Seventy years. Plus six.
Martha Argerich turns 80…
Malcolm Arnold (1921 – 2006) Let’s put away Beethoven, Brahms and Tchaikovsky for a year and play Arnold’s wonderful music.
Aida was composed in 1871 – let’s have some 150th anniversary performances.
You can’t do Aida. It’s cultural appropriation.
The 230th anniversary of Mozart’s death, the 40th anniversary of Samuel Barber’s death, and the 130th anniversary of Prokofiev’s birth.
Malcolm Arnold, born in 1921.
Pauline Viardot, bicentennial!! 1821-1910 Singer, composer, vocal pedagogue
You´re right. Admired by Chopin, Liszt, Clara and Robert Schumann, Brahms, Fauré, Saint-Saëns, George Sand, Anselm Feuerbach, Ivan Turguenev … Great singer, pianist, composer and vocal pedagogue!
It makes NO sense to commemorate years of death. Never did. Never will. Detracts from the important anniversaries, which is partly why Beethoven 250 got little notice.
Bruno Maderna (21 April 1920 – 13 November 1973)Â
Born 100 yrs ago:
Hilde Rössel-Majdan
Mario LanzaÂ
Astor PiazzollaÂ
Arthur GrumiauxÂ
Franco CorelliÂ
Sieglinde Wagner
Marga Höffgen
Dennis BrainÂ
Walter Barylli
Giuseppe di Stefano
Lola BobescoÂ
Agnes Giebel
Sena JurinacÂ
Georges CziffraÂ
Géza Anda
Malcolm Arnold, born 1921.
To mark 50 years since Stravinsky died, my vote is for “The ERake’s Progress”, “Oedipus Rex”, the Octet, and Four Norwegian Moods with a good horn section.
We sometimes hear Humperdinck without realizing it: he wrote the concert ending for Siegfried’s Rhine Journey used in separate performances and recordings of it. I’d love to hear “Koenigskinder”. He helped recover and assemble the parts and score of Wagner’s early four-movement symphony and delivered them to him in Venice, where Wagner conducted for the last time rehearsing it.
2021-2022 should be a Xenakis season. Born 1922, died in 2001.
Yeah, that’ll fill the house!
A few additional anniversaries:
25 years since the deaths of Toru Takemitsu, Mieczyslaw Weinberg and Vagn Holmboe
50 years since the deaths of Marcel Dupre, Alan Rawsthorne and Carl Ruggles
75 years since the births of Colin Matthews and Howard Shore, and the death of Manuel de Falla
100 years since the birth of Malcolm Arnold
125 years since the births of Howard Hanson, Virgil Thomson and Roger Sessions, and the deaths of Clara Schumann and Anton Bruckner
200 years since the birth of Pauline Viardot
400 years since the deaths of Michael Praetorius and Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck
500 years since the death of Robert Fayrfax
Odd choices. No Handel, Bach, Haydn or Mozart?
2021 is the 230th anniversary of Mozart’s death.
Dennis Brain 100
Thank you adding Dennis Brain. He was born on May 17th 1921. The greatest horn player who has ever lived and always will be.
Oh, to add to Dennis Brian 100:
Malcolm Arnold 100
Joonas Kokkonen 100
Dimitri Mitropoulos 125
Howard Hanson 125
Virgil Thompson 125
Wilfred Pelletier 125
Joonas Kokkonen. Amen.
What about Beethoven???
Indeed. It is exactly a year since the music world tried to begin to commemorate his 150th birth year.
We can always use more Zemlinsky!
Sure we can!
Part one of a four articles
https://basiaconfuoco.com/2019/10/14/alexander-zemlinsky-part-1-the-man/
Bruno Maderna was born in 1920! Died in 1973!
Alphons Diepenbrock, the foremost Dutch composer around 1900 died in 1921. So, another 100 years there.
Thank you but I think you’ll find Bruno Maderna was born in 1920
Giuseppe di Stefano 100
Victor Ullmann was born today 123 years ago
https://basiaconfuoco.com/2019/11/07/persian-poems-about-the-pleasures-of-wine-set-to-music-by-a-czech-jew/
Piazzolla. Doubles…
How did overhyped, overrated, mediocre singer like Anna Netrebko get into this illustrious company?!
If you count 25, 75, 125 years etc there are more well known musicians to be added but can I also mention
Louis Armstrong 50 (death)
Carl Tausig 150 (death)
Yves Montand 100 (born)
Jan Sweelinck 400 (death)
2021 is also the 300th birthday of the Lady Blunt Stradivarius violin. One of the best preserved of all Strads.
Let us not forget JaromÃr Weinberger on the 125th anniversary of his birth (08.January.1896)!!!
It is also the 400th anniversary of the death of Jan Pieterszoon Sweelinck