MUSIClassical ALLEGRO
Topic: MILESTONESJun-Dec07
Prague, Dec 21 (CTK) - Czech composer Jiri Pauer died in Prague Friday [21 DEC 2007] at the age of 88, Czech Philharmonic Orchestra general director Vaclav Riedlbauch told CTK. Pauer was chief of the Prague National Theatre's Opera and he was the theatre director in 1979-1989. He participated in the organisation of the Prague Spring music festivals, was a professor at the Prague Academy of Performing Arts (AMU) and headed the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra for over 20 years. Pauer composed many pieces, many of which focus on the brass orchestral instruments, symphonies, and further orchestra pieces, a horn concerto and a trumpet concerto, chamber music pieces, and piano pieces. He also composed five operas. 
Mother and son join the Detroit Symphony Orchestra for a stirring rendition of Felix Mendelssohn's vision of Shakespeare's woodland fantasy A Midsummer Night's Dream. Conductor Dmitry Sitkovetsky (pronounced sitt-kuh-VETT-skee) leads the Detroit Symphony Orchestra and his mother, legendary pianist Bella Davidovich, who will perform Schumann's beautiful Piano Concerto while Sitkovetsky himself takes center stage as soloist on Bach's Violin Concerto No. 1. The concerts take place in Orchestra Hall at the Max M. Fisher Music Center on Friday, January 4 at 8 p.m.; Saturday, January 5 at 8:30 p.m.; and Sunday, January 6 at 3 p.m. Famed Russian pianist Bella Davidovich performs Schumann's Piano Concerto. Celebrating her 80th birthday in 2008, she began studying the piano at the age of 6. At 18 she entered the Moscow Conservatory and, in 1949, became the youngest pianist to win the prestigious Chopin International Piano Competition in Warsaw. She has been touring for more than half a century since then, performing with the most well-known orchestras and conductors around the world. She has performed with her son Dmitry Sitkovetsky since 1966, and the pair has recorded sonatas together by Grieg, Brahms and Ravel. 
1907 Birth of Dutch conductor and composer Willem van OTTERLOO in Winterswijk. d-Melbourne, Australia 1978. Director of Melbourne and Sydney Symphony Orchestras. 
If you are a classical music lover who is your favourite composer?
Our annual retrospective of the major figures in classical music who left us during the year is especially significant for 2007 with the list including the deaths of four of the world's most honored and respected performers: tenors Luciano Pavarotti and Jerry Hadley, cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich and soprano Beverly Sills. 