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NEWS ABOUT: composer

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Epilepsy Likely Fueled Chopin's Visions

Composer saw creatures emerging from piano

(Newser) - The 19th-century composer Frédéric Chopin suffered frightening hallucinations, ranging from ghosts to creatures coming out of his piano. Now, researchers believe the visions may have been prompted by temporal lobe epilepsy, the Daily Telegraph reports. The disease can cause short, detailed hallucinations, and “could easily have been... More »

Outcry Kills Plans for Wagner, Israel Reconciliation

Composer's great-granddaughter calls off Israel trip

(Newser) - The great-granddaughter of Hitler's favorite composer has called off a visit to Israel amid a public outcry. Katharina Wagner had planned to announce that the Israel Chamber Orchestra would be invited to play at an annual festival in Germany celebrating Richard Wagner's music. Israeli orchestras have been boycotting the anti-Semitic... More »

Composers Seek Pay Tune-Up With Teamsters

Hollywood composers, lyricists form alliance with Local 399

(Newser) - A group of composers for movies and TV seeking a better deal now have the Teamsters in their corner. The musicians, who complain that their pay is shriveling as studios expect them to absorb more costs, were one of the few groups of Hollywood workers not covered by union contracts.... More »

Lloyd Webber Diagnosed With Prostate Cancer

Disease in early stage; expects to be back at work before end of year

(AP) - British composer Andrew Lloyd Webber has been diagnosed with prostate cancer, a spokeswoman said today in a statement that said "the condition is in its very early stages. Andrew is now undergoing treatment and expects to be fully back at work before the end of the year." More »

Beach Boy Wilson to Complete Gershwin Songs

Project a 'weird dream come true' for fans of 2 seminal American composers

(Newser) - Beach Boys songster Brian Wilson will put a gloss on unfinished tunes by revered Jazz Age composer George Gershwin. Gershwin’s estate tells the Los Angeles Times that dozens of fragments, from “a few bars to some almost finished songs and everything in between,” have been in limbo... More »

Hold Music Improves, But Slowly

(Newser) - We may have Erik Satie to blame for hold music—the composer “developed a very cynical attitude” toward a distracted listening public and decided modern music would be more like a chair than an intellectual pursuit—but the science behind it is state-of-the-art, Newsweek reports. Studies on the intrusion... More »

iTunes Offers Silent Freebie

First movement of John Cage's 4'33 becomes April Fool's giveaway

(Newser) - ITunes' April 1 giveaway is a landmark composition by avant-garde American composer John Cage, Gizmodo reports. The first movement of Cage's 4'33—an experimental piece consisting entirely of silence—has been made available for free download, although listeners who enjoy the first minute and 46 seconds of silence and want... More »

Doctor Zhivago Composer Dies

Maurice Jarre worked with Hollywood legends

(Newser) - Maurice Jarre, the composer who wrote the Oscar-winning scores of Lawrence of Arabia, Doctor Zhivago and A Passage to India, has died of cancer at the age of 84. The Frenchman—who rose to fame after moving to Los Angeles in the '60s—worked with such film director legends as... More »

To Combat Digital Piracy, Try Stealing

Composer pitches real-world thievery to help raise awareness

(Newser) - A Hollywood composer wants you to stop illegally downloading music, and he's willing to put his freedom in jeopardy to make his point. Because the public doesn't seem to equate swapping digital files with stealing, Richard Gibbs is pushing for people to swipe other products in a nationwide "day... More »

Composers Score With Video-Game Gigs

Film-like scores have taken strides with technology—and pay as much as $2K/minute

(Newser) - The musical scores for video games have kept pace with the evolution of the games themselves, the Los Angeles Times reports, with composers bringing in as much as $2,000 per minute to create sweeping, film-like compositions. With sales projected to hit $50 billion this year, game developers can budget... More »

US Composer Says Feds Are After Him

John Adams claims agents have targeted him for his politics

(Newser) - One of the most famous composers in America insists that Homeland Security has targeted him for his liberal views, the Guardian reports. John Adams, who achieved fame with his Nixon in China opera 20 years ago, says airport immigration grills him whenever he comes home. "I'm perfectly aware that... More »

'Grateful' Symphony Debuts

Baltimore to unveil work based on various Dead classics

(Newser) - The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra will debut this week an opera derived from the music of the Grateful Dead, on what would have been Jerry Garcia’s 66th birthday. Titled Dead Symphony No. 6, each movement goes truckin' on a different Dead song. The Grateful Dead is “long overdue to... More »

Video-Game Industry Scores Big-Name Composers

Established names drawn to new, lucrative branch of composition

(Newser) - Far from the shrill beeps of a decade ago, video-game music has come into its own with compositions approaching the maturity of film scores, BusinessWeek reports. A new wave of composers is putting time and effort into sophisticated soundtracks that mark the continuing expansion of video games as a form... More »

Global Warming, the Opera

La Scala plans operatic version of Al Gore's climate change documentary

(Newser) - It started out as a slide show, became an Oscar-winning documentary and best-selling book, and now Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth is about to become a full-length opera, reports the AP. Milan's La Scala opera house has commissioned Italian composer  Giorgio Battistelli to set Gore's stark warning on global warming... More »

Shhh! Europe Law Forces Orchestras to Tone It Down

Noise legislation means musicians are playing musical chairs, the real game

(Newser) - A new law in Europe to protect employees from ear-damaging noises is stifling a surprise industry—orchestras. Conductors are taking it down a notch to comply, in one case canceling a world premiere because it exceeded the allowable decibels in rehearsal, the New York Times reports. At the Royal Opera... More »

Scots Build Replica of Bach's Head

Rendering is based on a cast, portrait, and papers from his time

(Newser) - Forensic artists have re-created Johann Sebastian Bach’s head based on a cast of his skull and documents from the composer’s time, the BBC reports. The model, built at Scotland’s Dundee University, is “the most complete face that can be built from the available reliable information,”... More »

Philip Glass: Trained By Life

Minimalist composer talks odd jobs, '60s NYC, making money and using drugs

(Newser) - Philip Glass paid $30 in rent in 1960s New York City, drove a cab to support his composing, and didn't make a dime on his work until he was 41. "I was trained by life," Glass tells Details of working at the kitchen table while his kids watched... More »

Composer Stockhausen Dead at 79

Creator of world's longest opera inspired many, including the Beatles

(Newser) - Karlheinz Stockhausen, the controversial composer who wrote the world's longest opera—29 hours, to be played over 7 days—has died at the age of 79, the Guardian reports. Though he inspired the Beatles and won high critical acclaim, Stockhausen also snubbed modern music trends and received little mainstream acceptance... More »

The 100 Biggest Brains in the World

The top living geniuses dominate fields from physics to animation

(Newser) - The Daily Telegraph jumps to point out that a quarter of its list of 100 living geniuses are British, and that that's one living genius per 2.5 million people—a higher proportion than for any other country. Americans still dominate the list, though, with a hefty 43 geniuses.
  1. Albert
... More »

Composer Gone Wild? Vivaldi Faces Lurid Spotlight

Authors, movie focus on his sex life

(Newser) - The life of Vivaldi, the Italian composer best known for The Four Seasons and the Gloria, is music to the ears of authors and Hollywood producers. Two new books and an upcoming movie dwell on the supposedly salacious details of his 18th-century personal life, though at least one researcher thinks... More »

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