11-26: Soulja Slim The Streets Made Me 2001 - Grieg Complete Lyric Pieces / Goldenweiser 1952-1954 - Pierre Vachon | Nicholas d'Alayrac / Loewenguth String Quartet 1959

Not shown above: Friedrich Heine, Edward Julius Biedermann

1717 – Daniel Purcell (English composer & organist, younger brother of Henry)
1778 – Jean-Noël Hamal (Belgian composer)
1809 – Nicolas-Marie d'Alayrac (French composer)
1810 – Nicolas Étienne Framéry (French writer, poet, dramaturge & composer)
1821 – Friedrich Heine (German composer)
1822 – Johann Baptist Henneberg (German composer)
1866 – Adrien-François Servais (Belgian cellist & composer)
1880 – Guilherme António Cossoul (Portuguese cellist & composer)
1925 – Johannes Haarklou (Norwegian composer)
1933 – Edward Julius Biedermann (American organist, teacher & composer)
1956 – Tommy Dorsey (American jazz trombonist & bandleader)
1959 – Albert Ketèlbey (English composer, conductor & pianist)
1961 – Alexander Goldenweiser [Александр Гольденвейзер] (Russian pianist, teacher & composer)
1963 – Amelita Galli-Curci (Italian coloratura soprano)
1966 – Harold Burrage (American blues, R&B & soul singer & pianist)
1982 – Juhan Aavik (Estonian composer, conductor, trumpeter & teacher)
1987 – Emmanuel Bondeville (French composer, organist & radio & opera company administrator)
1994 – Nimrod Workman (American folksinger, coal miner & trade unionist)
1996 – Dame Joan Hammond (Australian soprano & champion golfer)
1997 – Francis Paudras (French artist, author, amateur pianist & jazz patron)
2002 – Polo Montañez (Cuban folk & pop singer, songwriter & guitarist)
2003 – Soulja Slim (American rapper & songwriter)
2005 – Mark Craney (American rock & jazz drummer, Jethro Tull, Tommy Bolin, Jean-Luc Ponty)

Welcome to YiDM, the only place in the blogosphere where you can find 18th-century French string quartets and Southern gangsta rap in the same post.

10-14a: Arcadelt Madrigals : Rooley 1987 - Bing Crosby & Louis Armstrong 1960 - Grieg Lyric Pieces / Gilels 1974

1568 – Jacob Arcadelt (Franco-Flemish composer & singer, active in Italy & France)
1669 – Antonio Cesti (Italian composer, singer & organist)
1771 – František Xaver Brixi (Czech composer, organist & music director)
1847 – William Michael Rooke (Irish violinist & composer)
1857 – Ignacy Marceli Komorowski (Polish composer, pianist, violinist, cellist & teacher)
1877 – Antoine Elwart (French composer, musicologist & writer on music)
1900 – Sándor Erkel (Hungarian composer & conductor)
1909 – Gottfred Matthison-Hansen (Danish organist, composer & teacher)
1919 – Jean Louis Nicodé (German composer, conductor, pianist & teacher of French ancestry)
1923 – George Whiting (American composer, organist & teacher)
1929 – Henri Berger (German composer & royal bandmaster of the Kingdom of Hawai'i)
1957 – Natanael Berg (Swedish composer)
1958 – Jean Poueigh (French music critic)
1966 – Arcady Dubensky [Аркадий Дубенский] (Russian-born American composer, violinist &pianist)
1972 – Joseph Kaminski (Polish-born Israeli violinist & composer, concertmaster of Israel Philharmonic)
1977 – Bing Crosby (American pop singer & actor)
1981 – Ingemar Liljefors (Swedish composer, pianist, writer on music & teacher)
1985 – Emil Gilels [Емі́ль Гі́лельс, Эми́ль Ги́лельс] (Ukrainian pianist & teacher)
1987 – Rodolfo Halffter (Spanish composer)

Well, crap. It's another one of THOSE days! It'll be in two separate posts again. In the second one, I'll be taking advantage of one of our best opportunities yet to commemorate the centennial of Gus Mahler's death. It's a very, very, very prominent Mahlerian in this case! As far as this first post goes, I'd urge you to check out that supplemental reading. It broaches on one of the most treasured enregistral contributions by one of the most celebrated pianists of the mid-to-late 20th century, Emil Gilels.

The reading also tells of Jacob (or Jacques) Arcadelt, one of the greatest Franco-Flemish composers of the generation who were born just after the turn of the 16th century, along with Clemens non Papa and Cipriano de Rore. I'd especially urge you to investigate the readings on Arcadelt since they feature some great singers, most notably Emma Kirkby, that heavenly voice that has contributed so much to historically-informed performances of Renaissance and Baroque music since the 1960s.

Finally, I'd like you to imagine something. Imagine Bing Crosby and Louis Armstrong on an album, together. They're singing and playing a lot of those old tunes from the New Orleans days, like "At the Jazz Band Ball" and Kid Ory's "Muskrat Ramble." Now, imagine they add some great bluesy numbers from the early swing period, such as Hoagy Carmichael's "Lazy River." Now imagine this: they also do that great gospel-tinged number "The Preacher" by hard bop master pianist & composer Horace Silver! Okay, you can stop imagining now. It's there in the extra reading, too!

09-04: Mahler 8 Stokowski live 1950 - Stellakis & Rita Rebetiko - Bach / Albert Schweitzer 1935 - Grieg Holberg Suite / Oslo Camerata 2006

1759 – Girolamo Chiti (Italian composer & biographer of Giuseppe Pitoni)
1827 – Michael Pamer (Austrian composer & conductor)
1844 – Oliver Holden (American minister & hymn composer)
1853 – Jonathan Blewitt (English organist & composer, active in Ireland)
1903 – Herman Zumpe (German conductor & composer)
1907 – Edvard Grieg (Norwegian composer & pianist)
1937 – Giovanni Salviucci (Italian composer & organist)
1937 – Stanisław Dobrzański (Polish tenor)
1937 – Vasily Petrov (Ukrainian operatic lyric bass)
1965 – Albert Schweitzer (Alsatian theologian, physician, missionary, philosopher, organist & Bach scholar)
1977 – Stellakis [Stelios Perpiniadis] (Greek rebetiko singer, songwriter & guitarist)
1991 – Carlos Alexander (American baritone)
1991 – Charlie Barnet (American jazz saxophonist, composer & bandleader, "Cherokee")
1991 – Dottie West (American country singer, songwriter & guitarist)
1995 – Chuck Greenberg (American new age musician & producer, Shadowfax)
1997 – Belle Stewart (Scottish folksinger)
2002 – Vlado Perlemuter (Lithuanian-born French pianist)
2003 – Tibor Varga (Hungarian violinist & conductor)
2003 – Lola Bobesco (Romanian-born Belgian violinist)
2006 – Astrid Varnay (Swedish-born American dramatic soprano of Hungarian ancestry)

Write-up pending. Won't really be all that much to say, though. I mean, you got your Grieg, you got your Dottie West, you got your Charlie Barnet, you got your Albert Schweitzer (he didn't just give medical attention to African children, he played the organ and wrote about Bach, too), and you got some pretty famous violinists & singers. You also got your first chance to pay a little attention to Gustav Mahler, like we're trying to do during this, his death centenary year. Haven't been any Mahler conductors of note on our lists in the past month, but baritone Carlos Alexander fits the bill, thanks to a certain landmark Carnegie Hall performance he participated in. Of course, he was just one performer among, oh, about 1000 others, I guess (*wink*wink*), but he does get a big solo in one part.

You know what, forget about the "write-up pending" nonsense. I'm going to go ahead and call this one finished, even though it might have been nice to say some things about Stellakis Perpiniadis, and Lola Bobesco, and Belle Stewart, and Astrid Varnay, and even Edvard Grieg, famous as he is. Go, now, and do what you know you must...