Obscure Music Mondays

Horatio William Parker (Sept. 15, 1863 - December 18, 1919 )was an American composer, teacher, and organist, who came to be a part of the Second New England School, also commonly known as the Boston Six, along with Amy Beach, George Whitefield Chadwick, Arthur Foote, Edward MacDowell, and John Knowles Paine. Continue reading →

Amy Marcy Cheney Beach (Sept. 5, 1867 - December 27, 1944) was an American composer and pianist.  Extremely gifted from a young age, Beach's talents seemed to run in the family, with various members playing instruments or singing, and showing great aptitude for music. Continue reading →

Marie-Juliette Olga "Lili" Boulanger (Aug. 21, 1893 - March 15, 1918) was a French composer, and  sister of the famous composer and teacher Nadia Boulanger. We have featured Lili's works before for Obscure Music Monday, which you can read about here and here, along with more of her background. Lili Boulanger was found to have perfect pitch at age 2, and...

Martin Pierre Dalvimare (Sept. 18, 1772 - June 3, 1839) was a French harpist and composer. He had a comfortable childhood, and learned both harp and harpsichord at a young age. Continue reading →

Paul (Russian: Pavel) Pabst (May 15, 1854 - June 9, 1897) was a pianist and composer born in to a family of musicians in East Prussia. Pabst was fortunate to meet Anton Rubinstein as a young child, and moved to Russia in 1878. In that same year, Pabst, who was an accomplished pianist by this time, accepted Nikolai Rubinstein's invitation to become a professor at the Moscow Conservatory. Continue reading →

Hyacinthe Jadin (April 27, 1776 - Sept. 27, 1800) was a pianist and composer born in to a musical family in Versailles. His uncle George Jadin was a composer, and his father was an orchestral musician. He also had five musical brothers. Continue reading →

Ludvig Albert Hegner (May 1, 1851 - Nov. 7, 1923) was a Danish double bassist and composer, born in Copenhagen. There is not a great deal known about him, and what is known mainly surrounds his work as a double bassist. Continue reading →

Marie-Juliette Olga "Lili" Boulanger (Aug. 21, 1893 - March 15, 1918) was a French composer, and  the younger sister of the famed composition teacher/composer Nadia Boulanger. Born in Paris, Lili Boulanger was a child prodigy; at the age of two, it was discovered that she had perfect pitch. Her parents, both musicians, encouraged her musical education, and she would accompany her sister Nadia to classes at the Paris Conservatory, studying music theory and organ. Her sister Nadia was one of her teachers, and later on studied with Paul Vidal, George Caussade, and Gabriel Faure, who was particularly impressed by her abilities. Lili would go on to win the Prix de Rome at the age of 19; she was the first woman to ever win the composition prize. Tragically, she died at the young age of 24. Continue reading →

Serge Alexandrovich Koussevitzky (July 26, 1874 - June 4, 1951) was a Russian composer, conductor and double bassist. Born in to a musical family, his parents taught him violin, cello, piano, and trumpet. At 14 years old he won a scholarship to study the double bass at the Musico-Dramatic Institute of the Moscow Philharmonic Society, where he excelled in his studies. Continue reading →

Henri Édouard Dallier (March 20, 1849 - December 23, 1934) was a French organist born in Reims. Dallier was a student of César Franck at the Paris Conservatory, and received a First prize diploma in organ and fugue in 1878.  In 1879 he became "titular du grand orgue" of Saint Eustache, and in 1905 succeeded Gabriel Faure as the organist of la Madeleine. Continue reading →