Today's the Day

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

March 10th

Or "Mar10", which looks a little bit like "Mario", and so Nintendo has designated this Date "Mario Day" to honour the plumber hero of computer games. The Prophets of Capitalism.

Also, more traditionally, the Feast Day of St Himelin, an Eighth Century Celtic (Scottish or Irish) priest, who, the story goes, fell ill when returning home from a pilgrimage to Rome, and begged water from a girl in Vissenaken (in present-day Belgium). Initially she refused, telling him that there was bubonic plague in the village, but when he persisted, she gave him a cup, which miraculously turned into wine as soon as it touched his lips. Three days later he died of the plague, at which exact moment, the church bells began ringing of their own accord.

Also on this Date: the first Punic War is ended when the Romans sink the Carthaginian fleet (241BCE); the first National Census of England, Scotland, and Wales is carried out, revealing a total population of just under 11 million (1801); Napoleon sells French territories in America to the United States - the Louisiana Purchase entails over 800,000 miles of land, and raised 68 million francs (worth over £460billion today) to fund Napoleon's armies (1804); Prussian forces defea.t Napoleon at the Battle of Laon (1814); Abraham Lincoln applies to patent an invention: a device for lifting ships over shoal (1849); Amy Spain is executed for stealing - the last [legally-sanctioned] execution of a slave in the USA (1865); Karl Goldmark's The Queen of Sheba is premiered in Vienna (1875); Alexander Graham Bell makes his historic first successful telephone call "Mr Watson, come here, I want to see you" (1876); Alexander Borodin's Symphony #2 is premiered in St Petersberg (1877); Cesar Franck's Psyche is premiered in Paris (1888); the University of New Mexico State cancels its very first Graduate Ceremony: the only Graduate had been shot to death the night before (1893 - the unfortuante man is honoured instead by a road, Sam Steel Way, on campus); Europe's worst mining disaster, an explosion of coal dust at the Courrieres Mine in Northern France, claims nearly 1100 lives (1906 - on the same day in Lyon, Ravel's Sonatine is given its first complete public performance by Paule de Lestang, and the Baker Street and Waterloo Railway is opened in London); suffragist Mary Richardson [later a member of the British Union of Fascists] slashes Velasquez's "Rokeby Venus" seven times with a meat cleaver (1918); Mahatma Gandhi is arrested in India for sedition (1922); three months before elections in Cuba, General Fulgencio Batista, whose party was third in ppularity, stages a military coup and seizes power (1952); the complete version of Tennessee Williams' Sweet Bird of Youth is premiered on Braodway, and the Tibetan Uprising against the Chinese PLA begins (both 1959); the Philadelphian Phillies baseball team refuse to stay at the Jack Tar Harrison Hotel in Florida, bacause it refused to accommodate black and hispanic players (192); at the opening of his trial for the murder of Martin Luther King, James Earl Ray [whose 41st birthday it was] pleads guilty (1969); a ring system around Uranus [oh, give over!] first suggested by William Herschel in 1789, but not seen by anyone else in the intervening years, is confirmed by astronomers using the Kuiper Airborne Observatory [who hadn't been looking for any rings] (1977); Syzygy: all nine planets allign on the same side of the Sun (1982); Arvo Part's Hymn to a Great City is premiered in New York (1984); and Birtwistle's Machaut a ma Ma Maniere is premiered in Hamburg (1990).

Birthdays today include: Ferdinand II of Castile & Leon (1452); Lorenzo Da Ponte (1749); Joseph, Freiherr von Eichendorff (1788); Pablo de Sarasate (1844); Alexander III of Russia (1845); Tamara Karsavina (1885); Arthur Honegger (1892); Bix Beiderbecke (1903); Wally Stott, later Angela Morley (1924); Marcia Falkender (1932); Sepp Blatter (1936); Osama Bin Laden (1957); Michel van der Aa (1970); Mauro Lanza (1976); and Rafe Spall (1983);

Final Days for: Muzio Clementi (1832); Ignaz Moscheles (1870); Giuseppe Mazzini (1872); Carl Reinecke (1910); Harriet Tubman (1913); Mikhail Bulgakov (1940); Zelda Fitzgerald (1948); Frank O'Connor (1966); E Power Biggs (1977); Bill Hopkins (1981); William Brocklesby Wordsworth (1988); Giorgos Zampetas (1992); Lloyd Bridges (1998); Dave Allen (2005); Anna Moffo (2006); Jean Giraud (2012); and Keith Emerson and Anita Brookner (both 2016).


And the Radio 3 schedules for the morning of Friday, 10th March, 1989 were:

Morning Concert: Borodin Nocturne; Poulenc Piano Concerto; Boccherini Cello Concerto in B flat; Chopin Polonaise in A flat, Op 53; Dvorak Cypress #1; Enesco Romanian Rhapsody #1.
This Week's Composer: Musorgsky (excerpts from Khovanshchina; Song Cycle Sunless)
Song & Dance: Rebel Les Elemens (excerpts); Dowland Songs, including "A Shepherd in a Shade" and "Sweet, Stay Awhile"; Beethoven Ballet:"The Creatures of Prometheus", Op 43; Monteverdi Quel sguardo sdegnosetto; Eri gia tutta mia; Lasciatemi morire;
Virgil Thomson "Acadian Songs and Dances" (from "Louisiana Story"); Strauss "Dance of the Seven Veils" (from "Salome") [The Composer (piano)]; Mozart Ballet music from "Idomeneo"
Max Bruch: Symphony No 1 in E flat, Op 28; BBCCO (leader Martin Loveday) conducted by James Lockhart.

[Richard Tarleton]

Another fascinating feast of facts, ferney

the first National Census of England, Scotland, and Wales is carried out, revealing a total population of just under 11 million (1891);

Is this right? Not 1801? - I ask because I've amassed lots of census records for 19thC ancestors, including several from the 1841 census, but to be fair those ones are all in England....

[Edgy 2]

Andy Gibb died on this day (10th March) 31 years ago

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Is this right? Not 1801? - I ask because I've amassed lots of census records for 19thC ancestors, including several from the 1841 census, but to be fair those ones are all in England....

Yes - I'm not very good at typing and my fingers often "miss" (and I keep typing "paino" instead of "piano" for some reason - and "perfromance"). Dluy crroectde.

[edashtav]

Virgil Thomson "Acadian Songs and Dances" (from "Louisiana Story")

I love the innocence and charm of this slight score.

[greenilex]

RIP Anita Brookner. Problematical novels, restricted, beautifully crafted, shadowy...not a depiction of women’s lives that I myself recognise, but then families are so multifarious and I always find she piques my curiosity.

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

March 11th

On this date: Roman Emperor Heliogabalus and his mother are murdered by his Praetorian Guards, and their mutilated corpses are paraded in public (222); Empress Theodora ends the age of Iconoclasm in the Byzantine Empire (843); Mount Etna erupts - over the next five weeks the lava flow destroys at least 10 villages (1669); Britain's first daily newspaper, the Daily Courant goes on sale for the first time (1702); on the advice of her ministers, Olivia Co ... Queen Anne witholds Royal Assent to the Scottish Militia Bill that they had passed only a few days before - in the intervening period, French troops were sailing towards Scotland, and it was feared that the Bill would provide arms for a revolt against English rule. This is the last time in History [so far] tht Royal Assent was declined (1708); Baker & Leigh hold their very first auction - a sale of hundreds of books from Sir John Stanley's library - they later rename the company "Sotheby's" (1744); Haydn's "Miracle Symphony" is premiered in London (1791); the United States Department of War creates the Bureau of Indian [ie, native Americans, not ...] Affairs (1824); Mendelssohn conducts the first performance of his adaptation of Bach's St Matthew Passion (1829); Bellini's I Capuleti e i Montecchi is premiered in Venice (1830); Verdi's Rigoletto is premiered also in Venice (1851); the Constitution of the Confederate States of America is created (1961); cracks in the newly-built Dale Dyke Dam in Sheffield cause it to shatter as its reservoir is being filled for the first time: the resulting Great Sheffield Flood destroys over 600 houses, and causes at least 260 deaths (1864); Verdi's Don Carlo is premiered in paris (1867); a sudden drop in temperature after an unseasonably mild period causes devastating storms along the East Coast of the United States beginning today: the Great White Hurricane saw snowfall of upto six feet, and snow drift resulting from 45mph winds exceeding 50 feet - more than 500 people are killed (1888); Dvorak's Second Symphony in Bb is premiered in Prague (also 1888); Respighi's Fountains of Rome is premiered in Rome (1917); President Roosevelt signs the Lend-Lease Act [more properly "An Act to Promote the Defense of the United States"] (1941); British troops arrest gardener Franz Lang - who is actually Rudolf Höss, the Commandant of Auschwitz extermination camp (1946); Shostakovich completes his Twelfth String Quartet (1968); the Hanafi Siege in Washington DC comes to an end as Ambassadors from three Islamic Nations persuade the Muslim gunmen to release their 130 hostages (1977); Mikhail Gorbachev becomes leader of the Soviet Union (1985); the £1 note ceases to be legal tender (1988); the Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic decalres its independence from the USSR - and Patricio Aylwin becomes the first democratically elected President of Chile in 17 years following the end of the Pinochet dictatorship (both 1990); Paul McCartney is knighted (1997); Al-Qaeda plant bombs on four trains on the Madrid Underground, killing 193 people and injuring some 2000 others (2004); 17-year-old Tim Kretschmer shoots and kills fifteen of his fellow students at the Winnenden School in Germany before commiting suicide (2009); and in a referendum on the Falkland Islands, 99.8% vote in favour of remaining an Overseas Territory of the United Kingdom on a 92% turnout [there are, in fact, only three votes against] (2013).

Birthdays today include: Torquato Tasso (1544); Marcius Petipa (1818); Henry Tate (1819); Carl Ruggles (1876); Malcolm Campbell (1885); Henry Cowell (1897); Dorothy Gish (1898); Jessie Matthews (1907); Xavier Montsalvatge (1912); Harold Wilson (1916); Astar Pazzolla (1921); Rupert Murdoch (1931); Nigel Lawson (1932); Tristan Murail (1947); Bobby McFarrin (1950); Douglas Adams (1952); David Newman (1954); and John Barrowman (1967).

Final Days for: F W Marnau (1931); Alexander Fleming (1955); Haydn Wood (1959); Geraldine Farrar (1967); John Wyndham (1969); Erle Stanley Gardner (1970); Richard Brooks (1992); and Myfanwy Talog (1995).


And the Radio 3 shedules for the morning of Tuesday 11th March, 1969 were:

Overture: Gramophone records
Morning Concert: Gramophone records
This Week's Composer: Elgar (5 part songs, and the Violin Sonata)
Concerto: Paul Badura-Skoda/BBCWO/Moshe Atzmon (no details, but the programme was 75 mins long)
Music Making: lieder performed by Janet Baker & Paul Hamburger; Chamber Music performed by the Richards Pno4tet; "featuring Music by Saint-Saens"

[Joseph K]

and Patricio Aylwin becomes the first democratically elected President of Chile,

Not true...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salvador_Allende

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

Not true...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salvador_Allende

Awkward (and inexplicable) line break, which I've now fixed, Joseph "the first democratically elected president of Chile following the end of the Pinochet dictatorship". :smiley;

[Joseph K]

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

(Actually, it still seemed a bit ambiguous, so I've stuck an extra "in 17 years" in.)

[greenilex]

A little surprised by the long gap between halfway through ninth century CE and seventeenth ditto...something must have happened, I would surmise? Women’s business, perhaps?

[cloughie]

I wonder if the Dale Dyke breach was the origin of the expression ‘Once in in every Sheffield Flood’. ...and I love the reference back to Radio 3 playing ‘Gramophone Records’ - in these days of downloads and streaming it is a lovely retro term!

[ferneyhoughgeliebte]

March 12th

The Feast Day of Pope Gregory I ("Gregory the Great") who both sent Augustine to convert the "angels not Angles", and who organised the collection and standardisation of Plainchant for use in churches. Letters between Gregory and Augustine concerning church rules feature in Bede's History of the English Church and Peoples - where it often seems that Gregory had all the patience of the saint he became immediately after his death on this date in 604.

And World Day Against Cyber Censorship, as organised by Amnesty International, Reporters Without Borders, and

Also on this Date: the University of Vienna is founded (1365); deposed King James II/VII lands in Kinsdale, Ireland to seek support from his Irish supporters to regain his throne from William III - thuse beginning the War of the Two Kings (Cogadh an Dá Rí) which ends with the Battle of the Boyne two-and-a-half years later (1689); Henry Holland's newly designed Theatre Royal on Drury lane opens - the third theatre with this name on this site (1794); Jean Schneitzhöeffer's ballet with pioneering choreography by Filippo Taglioni, La Sylphide premieres in Paris (1832); Verdi's Simon Boccanegra is premiered in Venice (1857); Andrew Watson becomes the first black football player to captain a national team when he leads Scotland to a 6 - 1 victory over England (881 - his first appearance with the Scotland team, too); the first bottles of Coca-Cola go on sale in Mississippi - the drink had previously only been sold by the glass at drug stores as a remedy for "indigestion, nerve disorders, headaches, impotence, and morphine addiction" (1894); Vincent d'Indy's opera Fervaal is premiered in Brussels (1897); Busoni's Indian Fantasy is premiered in Berlin (1914); the St Francis Dam in Los Angeles fails - at least 431 people lose their lives (1928); Mahatma Gandhi begins a 200 mile march protesting about British imposition of a tax on salt (1930); Franklin D Roosevelt broadcasts the first of his "fireside chat" addresses to the Nation (1933); Hindemith's Symphony using material from his opera Mathis der Maler is premiered in Berlin by the BPO conducted by Furtwangler, in spite of official Nazi disapproval (1934); the 8th Army of the German Wehrmacht cross the border with Austria - this Anschluss is greeted by cheering crowds waving hakenkreuz flags (1938); Dennis the Menace makes his first appearance in The Beano on exactly the same day that the identically-named but totally unrelated character first appears in US newspaper strip (1951); the complete extant score of Schoenberg's Moses und Aron is premiered in a concert performance in Hamburg, conducted by Rosbaud (1954); Britten's 'Cello Symphony is premiered in Moscow by Rostropovich and the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by the composer (1964); Mauritius gains independence from Britain (1968) and, exactly 24 years later becomes a republic; the first 32 women priests of the Church of England are ordained (1994); Hungary, Poland, and the Czech republic joined NATO (1999); the WHO issues an international warning of the SARS disease epidemic (2003); and ten years ago, Bernie Madoff pleads guilty to security fraud (his Ponzi Scheme has defrauded $16 billion) - he is sentenced to 150 years in prison and "fined" over $17billion (2009).

Birthdays today include: Andre Le Notre (1613); John Aubrey (1626 - he lives over 72 years, which is pleasantly ironic); Richard Steele (1672); George Berkeley(1685); Thomas Arne (1710); William Buckland (1784); Alexandre Guilmant (1837); Gabriele D'Annunzio (1863); WHR Rivers (1864); Hans Knappertsbusch (1888); Vaclav Nijinsky (1890); Elaine De Kooning (1918); Ralph Shapey (1921); Jack Kerouac (1922); Horbert Branin (1923); Edward Albee (1928); Liza Minnelli (1948); and Pete Doherty is forty today.

Final Days for: John Bull (1628); Friedrich Kuhlau (1832); Charles-Marie Widor (1937); Charlie Parker (1955); Arnold Ridley (1984); Eugene Ormandy (1985); Yehudi Menuhin (1999); Alun Hoddinott (2008); and, four years ago today, TERRY PRATCHETT.


And the Radio 3 schedules for the morning of Tuesday, 12th March, 1979 were:

Overture: BBCWSO conducted by Norman Del Mar - Mozart Don Giovanni Ovt; Horn Concerto K447 (Barry Tuckwell); Sibelius Symphony #6 Op 104
Morning Concert : Strauss Horn Concerto, Op 11 ; Berlioz Love Scene, Romeo's Reverie, Feast of the Capulets ( Romeo and Juliet)
This Week's Composer: Haydn - Acide e Galatea Ovt; Piano Sonata in D; Violin Concerto in A
Talking About Music Antony Hopkins
Samuel Barber: Dover Beach; S4tet #1; 10 Hermit Songs
BBCSSO conducted by Karl Anton Rickenbacher: Ravel Rapsodie espagnole; Villa-Lobos Guitar Concerto (with Carlos Bonell); Albeniz Asturias (Leyenda) from Suite Española #1; Falla The Three-Cornered Hat excerpts. (With an interval talk on Opera Libretti by Everett Helm.)

[cloughie]

The Feast Day of Pope Gregory I ("Gregory the Great") who both sent Augustine to convert the "angels not Angles", and who organised the collection and standardisation of Plainchant for use in churches. Letters between Gregory and Augustine concerning church rules feature in Bede's History of the English Church and Peoples - where it often seems that Gregory had all the patience of the saint he became immediately after his death on this date in 604.

And World Day Against Cyber Censorship, as organised by Amnesty International, Reporters Without Borders, and

Also on this Date: the University of Vienna is founded (1365); deposed King James II/VII lands in Kinsdale, Ireland to seek support from his Irish supporters to regain his throne from William III - thuse beginning the War of the Two Kings (Cogadh an Dá Rí) which ends with the Battle of the Boyne two-and-a-half years later (1689); Henry Holland's newly designed Theatre Royal on Drury lane opens - the third theatre with this name on this site (1794); Jean Schneitzhöeffer's ballet with pioneering choreography by Filippo Taglioni, La Sylphide premieres in Paris (1832); Verdi's Simon Boccanegra is premiered in Venice (1857); Andrew Watson becomes the first black football player to captain a national team when he leads Scotland to a 6 - 1 victory over England (881 - his first appearance with the Scotland team, too); the first bottles of Coca-Cola go on sale in Mississippi - the drink had previously only been sold by the glass at drug stores as a remedy for "indigestion, nerve disorders, headaches, impotence, and morphine addiction" (1894); Vincent d'Indy's opera Fervaal is premiered in Brussels (1897); Busoni's Indian Fantasy is premiered in Berlin (1914); the St Francis Dam in Los Angeles fails - at least 431 people lose their lives (1928); Mahatma Gandhi begins a 200 mile march protesting about British imposition of a tax on salt (1930); Franklin D Roosevelt broadcasts the first of his "fireside chat" addresses to the Nation (1933); Hindemith's Symphony using material from his opera Mathis der Maler is premiered in Berlin by the BPO conducted by Furtwangler, in spite of official Nazi disapproval (1934); the 8th Army of the German Wehrmacht cross the border with Austria - this Anschluss is greeted by cheering crowds waving hakenkreuz flags (1938); Dennis the Menace makes his first appearance in The Beano on exactly the same day that the identically-named but totally unrelated character first appears in US newspaper strip (1951); the complete extant score of Schoenberg's Moses und Aron is premiered in a concert performance in Hamburg, conducted by Rosbaud (1954); Britten's 'Cello Symphony is premiered in Moscow by Rostropovich and the Moscow Philharmonic Orchestra conducted by the composer (1964); Mauritius gains independence from Britain (1968) and, exactly 24 years later becomes a republic; the first 32 women priests of the Church of England are ordained (1994); Hungary, Poland, and the Czech republic joined NATO (1999); the WHO issues an international warning of the SARS disease epidemic (2003); and ten years ago, Bernie Madoff pleads guilty to security fraud (his Ponzi Scheme has defrauded $16 billion) - he is sentenced to 150 years in prison and "fined" over $17billion (2009).

Birthdays today include: Andre Le Notre (1613); John Aubrey (1626 - he lives over 72 years, which is pleasantly ironic); Richard Steele (1672); George Berkeley(1685); Thomas Arne (1710); William Buckland (1784); Alexandre Guilmant (1837); Gabriele D'Annunzio (1863); WHR Rivers (1864); Hans Knappertsbusch (1888); Vaclav Nijinsky (1890); Elaine De Kooning (1918); Ralph Shapey (1921); Jack Kerouac (1922); Horbert Branin (1923); Edward Albee (1928); Liza Minnelli (1948); and Pete Doherty is forty today.

Final Days for: John Bull (1628); Friedrich Kuhlau (1832); Charles-Marie Widor (1937); Charlie Parker (1955); Arnold Ridley (1984); Eugene Ormandy (1985); Yehudi Menuhin (1999); Alun Hoddinott (2008); and, four years ago today, TERRY PRATCHETT.


And the Radio 3 schedules for the morning of Tuesday, 12th March, 1979 were:

Overture: BBCWSO conducted by Norman Del Mar - Mozart Don Giovanni Ovt; Horn Concerto K447 (Barry Tuckwell); Sibelius Symphony #6 Op 104
Morning Concert : Strauss Horn Concerto, Op 11 ; Berlioz Love Scene, Romeo's Reverie, Feast of the Capulets ( Romeo and Juliet)
This Week's Composer: Haydn - Acide e Galatea Ovt; Piano Sonata in D; Violin Concerto in A
Talking About Music Antony Hopkins
Samuel Barber: Dover Beach; S4tet #1; 10 Hermit Songs
BBCSSO conducted by Karl Anton Rickenbacher: Ravel Rapsodie espagnole; Villa-Lobos Guitar Concerto (with Carlos Bonell); Albeniz Asturias (Leyenda) Suite; Falla The Three-Cornered Hat excerpts. (With an interval talk on Opera Libretti by Everett Helm.)

The last days show 35 years since the demise of Private Godfrey, aka Doughy Hood from The Archers - maybe time for Artisan Baking to become part of the fayre of Ambridge’s Bridge Farm shop. Also Eugene Ormandy who was maybe America’s equivalent of Uncle Bernie - in his lifetime association with the Philadelphia Orchestra always delviered in a reliable unassuming way - many, many recordings. ...and Charlie Parker - did substances shorten a very promising career?