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harmony

(Encyclopedia)harmony, in music, simultaneous sounding of two or more tones and, especially, the study of chords and their relations. Harmony was the last in the development of what may be considered the basic elem...

Davies, Sir Peter Maxwell

(Encyclopedia)Davies, Sir Peter Maxwell dāˈvĭs [key], 1934–2016, English composer and conductor, b. Salford, studied Royal Manchester College of Music and Princeton with Roger Sessions and Milton Babbitt. He w...

Bernstein, Leonard

(Encyclopedia)Bernstein, Leonard bûrnˈstīn, –stēn [key], 1918–90, American composer, conductor, and pianist, b. Lawrence, Mass., grad. Harvard, 1939, and Curtis Institute of Music, 1941. A highly versatile ...

Berry, Chuck

(Encyclopedia)Berry, Chuck (Charles Edward Anderson Berry), 1926–2017, American rock music guitarist, singer, and songwriter, b. San Jose, Calif. Berry is widely regarded as one of the leading pioneers of rock mu...

Coleridge-Taylor, Samuel

(Encyclopedia)Coleridge-Taylor, Samuel, 1875–1912, English composer. He studied violin and composition at the Royal College of Music in London. He wrote many songs, orchestral works, piano pieces, and some chambe...

pizzicato

(Encyclopedia)pizzicato pĭtˌsəkäˈtō [key], in music, the technique of plucking the strings of an instrument that is usually bowed. Directions for playing pizzicato are found in early 17th-century music. Pagan...

Noseda, Gianandrea

(Encyclopedia)Noseda, Gianandrea, 1964–, Italian conductor, b. Milan. He has been principal conductor of the BBC Philharmonic (2002–11), music director of the Teatro Regio di Torino, Italy (2007–), and music ...

Taverner, John

(Encyclopedia)Taverner, John, c.1495–1545, English organist and composer. He was choirmaster at Oxford from 1526 to 1530. His small body of work—eight masses, 28 motets, and three secular songs—may be conside...

Swanson, Howard

(Encyclopedia)Swanson, Howard, 1909–78, American composer, b. Atlanta. He studied at the Cleveland Institute of Music and in Paris with Nadia Boulanger. Among his compositions are three symphonies, Night Music fo...

Sullivan, Sir Arthur Seymour

(Encyclopedia)Sullivan, Sir Arthur Seymour, 1842–1900, English composer, famous for a series of brilliant comic operas written in collaboration with the librettist W. S. Gilbert. As a boy he sang in the choir of ...