In fact, his heavy wine habit was thought to have caused him lead poisoning (it was a preservative), and the rich foods caused him gout. Handel was a big fan of the finer things in life, including heaps of rich food and wine. Frederic Handelĩ) Jumping back to the Baroque era, we have Handel the Food-Lover.Īlso when I was trying to verify this claim, I typed in “Handel loved food”, and Google gave me a bunch of websites on how to “melt away my love handles”. So props to Cosima for being thoughtful.Ĩ) Oh, and Cosima, Wagner’s wife, was one of Liszt’s illegitimate daughters. She did, however, give him a pink carpet made from flamingo feathers for one of his birthdays. He would order pink lacy costumes “for his wife” (she never mentioned these costumes in her diaries). Looking at pictures of Wagner and reading about his life and persona, he had a rather stereotypical “man” exterior. But one I find really interesting was his enjoyment of crossdressing. Richard Wagnerħ) Richard Wagner has many, many stories. He had wanted to be a priest off and on throughout his whole life, so finally in 1865, when Liszt was 54, he took the four minor orders (but never officially became a priest). But not everyone knows that, in older age, Liszt went through the process of becoming a Catholic priest. Franz LisztĦ) Most of us know that Franz Liszt lived the rockstar lifestyle as a youth, being very desirable and fathering children out of wedlock. Haydn wasn’t reunited with his real skull until 1954, and now his tomb has two skulls. Of course, people weren’t happy about this, so Peter and Rosenbaum returned a fake skull as Haydn’s. The guys who stole it, Johann Peter and Joseph Rosenbaum, had a collection of skulls that they displayed and liked to show people – including Haydn’s. This was because the kidnappers were interested in studying the brain of geniuses. About a week after Haydn’s death, his body was dug up and his head was kidnapped. At age 17, he was kicked out of singing school, partly because he had cut off the pigtail of another boy, but mainly because he had “matured” and his once-beautiful voice had turned to something described as “crowing”.Įmpress Maria Theresa herself complained to Reutter about his singing, calling it “crowing”.ĥ) Haydn had lots of interesting life stories, but he has a good post-death story, too. They were real-life friends/kindred spirits, and would often jam on the violins/violas together.Ĥ) Haydn was a goof who loved playing practical jokes. Interesting facts about classical composers: Joseph Haydnģ) When one mentions Mozart, one has to mention Haydn. The orchestra was handed the music moments before the performance, and…played it flawlessly. So at midnight that evening, Mozart went home and spent a few hours writing the masterpiece…while under the influence. Mozart was out drinking with friends and one of them mentioned, “Hey Mozart, how come you haven’t written the overture yet?” Eventually the husband starts meowing too – but musically, of course.Ģ) And another Mozart fact: You know the famous opera Don Giovanni? Well, the opening song, the orchestral overture, was written the night before the opera’s premier. He enjoyed imitating cats so much that he wrote a song called “The Cat Duet”, where the husband is singing questions to the wife and she only responds with “meow”. If he was bored during a rehearsal, he would leap around tables and meow. But not everyone knows he enjoyed imitating cats. Let’s start with Mozart, because everyone has heard of him!ġ) Most of us know that Mozart was a big fan of fart jokes and that he was a big silly jokester. Interesting Facts about Classical Composers: Mozart These interesting facts about classical composers are unabashedly influenced by John Green’s list videos over at Mental Floss – if you haven’t seen any of those videos, go check them out, they’re highly entertaining. However, I thought it would be fun to do a big compilation video of some random and weird facts I’ve come across. This spans the gamut from silly to weird – everything from coffee addiction to accidental suicide.Ī few of these facts are things I’ve mentioned in previous videos (like the brief history videos). In today’s video, we’re going to look at 17 interesting facts about classical composers.
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