Sergei Vasilievich Rachmaninoff[a] (Russian: Сергей Васильевич Рахманинов, Sergej Vasil’evič Rakhmaninov, 1 April 1873 [O.S. 20 March] – 28 March 1943) was a Russian composer, pianist, and conductor. He was one of the finest pianists of his day and, as a composer, the l
The portion of the nineteenth century that posterity has dubbed the Romantic era saw the birth of one of Western culture's greatest archetypes: the Romantic genius. The spirit of the age was incarnated in several dozen men and women, artists whose powers of expression were matched only by the origina
The great Modernist composer Benjamin Britten was born in Suffolk in 1913. He studied privately with composer Frank Bridge and later went to school at the Royal College of Music in London. Although he picked up technique effortlessly and gleaned a great deal of knowledge by following the examples of