JoAnn E. Kitchel

Seventeenth-century composer Johann Sebastian Bach helps young organist Johann Gottlieb Goldberg by giving him lessons and by presenting him with a composition which came to be called the Goldberg Variations. Includes historical notes.

After learning that he is going deaf, Beethoven is determined to write a great symphony and thinks he has found his inspiration in the heroic deeds of Napoleon.

Beethoven's Third Symphony was written as Beethoven was struggling with his advancing deafness. Meant as a celebration of Napoleon's victories, the four movements reflected Bonaparte's courage and heroism. Soon after Beethoven completed the work, he discovered Napolean's treachery in declaring himself Emperor of France, and the composer considered destroying the composition. Instead, The Bonaparte Symphony was later renamed the Eroica, or Heroic Symphony....

Camille Saint-Saëns was a brilliant French composer from the nineteenth century. In SAINT-SAËNS'S DANSE MACABRE, readers are transported to France in 1872 when Saint-Saëns visited the catacombs beneath the streets of Paris, known best as the final resting place of victims of the French Revolution. It was in this underground graveyard that Camille found the inspiration to compose Danse macabre, his spooky, mischievous masterpiece. Early performances...

Presents folktales, background information, and activities related to beliefs of peoples around the world about heavenly bodies, the seasons, and the weather.

In 1772, with summer long gone and winter fast approaching, Joseph Haydn, court musician to Prince Nicholas of Esterhazy, creates a symphony that finally persuades his oblivious employer to close up his summer palace and allow the staff to return home.