Quiz.

Started by Irons, January 19, 2019, 11:54:09 AM

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Florestan

Quote from: San Antone on January 21, 2019, 01:51:05 PM
In other words, Brahms.  But since I've already posed a question you should have a go at it since you obviously knew the answer.

Thanks. Here's mine.

This composer, soloist and teacher played a prominent role in the musical life of his country and was a highly acclaimed and well-connected member of her artistic and intellectual circles. He had a gentle and likeable personality (although later in life he became rather melancholy). Yet, none of his colleagues, friends, pupils and relatives attended his funeral.

Who was he?
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

ritter

Quote from: Florestan on January 22, 2019, 12:34:11 AM
Thanks. Here's mine.

This composer, soloist and teacher played a prominent role in the musical life of his country and was a highly acclaimed and well-connected member of her artistic and intellectual circles. He had a gentle and likeable personality (although later in life he became rather melancholy). Yet, none of his colleagues, friends, pupils and relatives attended his funeral.

Who was he?
Enescu?

Florestan

Quote from: ritter on January 22, 2019, 12:35:51 AM
Enescu?

Don't know the details of his funeral but no. Anyway, funny you should have been the first to reply.  ;)
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

ritter

Quote from: Florestan on January 22, 2019, 12:38:15 AM...Anyway, funny you should have been the first to reply.  ;)
? ? ?

Un abrazo,

Florestan

Quote from: ritter on January 22, 2019, 12:39:37 AM
? ? ?

That was a hint, actually.

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Un abrazo,

Likewise.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

ritter


Florestan

Quote from: ritter on January 22, 2019, 01:03:04 AM
NPI  ;D..


Granados?

Bingo! He had no funeral at all, he drowned in the English Channel in 1916.

[He] took a ship to England, where he boarded the passenger ferry SS Sussex for Dieppe, France. On the way across the English Channel, the Sussex was torpedoed by a German U-boat, as part of the German World War I policy of unrestricted submarine warfare. In a failed attempt to save his wife Amparo, whom he saw flailing about in the water some distance away, Granados jumped out of his lifeboat and drowned. However, the ship broke in two parts and only one sank (along with 80 passengers). Ironically, the part of the ship that contained his cabin did not sink and was towed to port, with most of the passengers, except for Granados and his wife, on board.

Your turn.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

vandermolen

Quote from: Florestan on January 22, 2019, 12:34:11 AM
Thanks. Here's mine.

This composer, soloist and teacher played a prominent role in the musical life of his country and was a highly acclaimed and well-connected member of her artistic and intellectual circles. He had a gentle and likeable personality (although later in life he became rather melancholy). Yet, none of his colleagues, friends, pupils and relatives attended his funeral.

Who was he?
That was a good choice of question.
"Courage is going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm" (Churchill).

'The test of a work of art is, in the end, our affection for it, not our ability to explain why it is good' (Stanley Kubrick).

ritter

Quote from: Florestan on January 22, 2019, 01:07:43 AM
Bingo! He had no funeral at all, he drowned in the English Channel in 1916.

[He] took a ship to England, where he boarded the passenger ferry SS Sussex for Dieppe, France. On the way across the English Channel, the Sussex was torpedoed by a German U-boat, as part of the German World War I policy of unrestricted submarine warfare. In a failed attempt to save his wife Amparo, whom he saw flailing about in the water some distance away, Granados jumped out of his lifeboat and drowned. However, the ship broke in two parts and only one sank (along with 80 passengers). Ironically, the part of the ship that contained his cabin did not sink and was towed to port, with most of the passengers, except for Granados and his wife, on board.

Your turn.
Thanks. It was a bit by elimination that I got to him. He had  to be Spanish, but couldn't be Falla or Albéniz .... Let me think of an appropriate question. Stay tuned!  :)

ritter

#49
OK, here goes.

This living composer's parents were instrumental in putting a famous American art patron's collection into safekeeping in a château in the Limousin just before the outbreak of WW2. The parents and the composer-to-be fled to America shortly afterwards.. Back in France, the  composer studied with a leading French composer who had himself been an émigré in the US (as well as with another composer who was briefly a POW).

The parents were famous in their own right in literary circles in France in the interwar period. The secured art collection is now exhibited in another European country. The composer's name only fleetingly appears when you make a search here in GMG (mainly in a short thread, the title of which could—in the current environment—be seen as pollitically incorrect).

So, who is this composer? (Bonus points: who are the two teachers I mentioned? Who was the art patron, and where is the collection exhibited nowadays?).

Florestan

#50
Quote from: ritter on January 22, 2019, 03:35:58 AM
This living composer's parents were instrumental in putting a famous American art patron's collection into safekeeping in a château in the Limousin just before the outbreak of WW2. The parents and the composer-to-be fled to America shortly afterwards.. Back in France, the  composer studied with a leading French composer who had himself been an émigré in the US (as well as with another composer who was briefly a POW).

The parents were famous in their own right in literary circles in France in the interwar period. The secured art collection is now exhibited in another European country. The composer's name only fleetingly appears when you make a search here in GMG (mainly in a short thread, the title of which could—in the current environment—be seen as pollitically incorrect).

So, who is this composer? (Bonus points: who are the two teachers I mentioned? Who was the art patron, and where is the collection exhibited nowadays?).

Off the top of my head, the collection must be Peggy Guggenheim's, currently located in Venice, Italy. The leading French composer former emigre to US, must be Milhaud. The French POW composer must be Messiaen. Am I on the right track?
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

ritter

Quote from: Florestan on January 22, 2019, 05:51:37 AM
Off the top of my head, the collection must be Peggy Guggenheim's, currently located in Bilbao, Spain. The leading French composer former emigre to US, must be Milhaud. The French POW composer must be Messiaen. Am I on the right track?
Very much so  ;)....except for the fact that Mrs. Guggenheim's collection is not in Bilbao, but in Venice.


Florestan

Quote from: ritter on January 22, 2019, 06:07:16 AM
Very much so  ;)....except for the fact that Mrs. Guggenheim's collection is not in Bilbao, but in Venice.



Actually I had updated my post but you were already posting your reply.

So, a living former student of both Milhaud and Messiaen whose parents were literary folks.... Ladies and gentlemen, meet Betsy Jolas8)
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

ritter

Quote from: Florestan on January 22, 2019, 06:10:11 AM
Actually I had updated my post but you were already posting your reply.

So, a living former student of both Milhaud and Messiaen whose parents were literary folks.... Ladies and gentlemen, meet Betsy Jolas8)
Bravo, Monsieur! A very interesting composer, whom I've just recently discovered.  :)

Back to you... ;)

Florestan

Quote from: ritter on January 22, 2019, 06:11:35 AM
Bravo, Monsieur! A very interesting composer, whom I've just recently discovered.  :)

A serial babe, right?  :laugh:

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Back to you... ;)

I must think about it. Give me some time.
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

ritter

Quote from: Florestan on January 22, 2019, 06:14:09 AM
A serial babe, right?  :laugh:
...
Yep. Hence my talk of possible political incorrectness (in this age if "MeToo" and all that)...

Florestan

Quote from: ritter on January 22, 2019, 06:50:11 AM
Yep. Hence my talk of possible political incorrectness (in this age if "MeToo" and all that)...

I like political incorrectness.  :D

So... He was born into a very musical and cultured family (his uncle and cousin were composers, his brother a philosopher, he was himself highly knowledgeable in, and heavily influenced by, poetry and philosophy). He was possibly the most opinionated and uncompromising composer and performer ever, which greatly damaged his reputation and career. He lived in relative poverty and dispiritedness. Near the end of his life he received moral and financial support from a most unlikely source (ie, coming from a country which most of us would probably utter one and the same name if hardpressed to name a native classical musician).

That should be piece of cake, I basically gave him away.  :)
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

ritter

Quote from: Florestan on January 22, 2019, 07:20:55 AM
I like political incorrectness.  :D

So... He was born into a very musical and cultured family (his uncle and cousin were composers, his brother a philosopher, he was himself highly knowledgeable in, and heavily influenced by, poetry and philosophy). He was possibly the most opinionated and uncompromising composer and performer ever, which greatly damaged his reputation and career. He lived in relative poverty and dispiritedness. Near the end of his life he received moral and financial support from a most unlikely source (ie, coming from a country which most of us would probably utter one and the same name if hardpressed to name a native classical musician).

That should be piece of cake, I basically gave him away.  :)
Could that be Medtner?

Florestan

#58
Quote from: ritter on January 22, 2019, 08:13:24 AM
Could that be Medtner?

The one and only. :)

The hint pointed to the Maharajah of Myssore and Zubin Mehta.

Zure txanda, jauna;D
Every kind of music is good, except the boring kind. — Rossini

ritter

#59
Quote from: Florestan on January 22, 2019, 10:50:41 AM
The one and only. :)
And the native classical musician from the same land as the Maharaja of Mysore would be Zubin Mehta? Although I first thought of Ravi Shankar (who did compose some "classical"—in the Western sense—concertos). [N.B.: I made this question before Florestan edited his message]

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....
Zure txanda, jauna;D
Eskerrik asko.  ;)

To avoid this turning into a ping pong match between Florestan and me, I invite any willing Fellow GMGer to submit the next question... :)