Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge

Synopsis

Today we honor one of America’s greatest patrons of chamber music, Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge, who died on this date in 1953.

Born in 1864, Elizabeth was the daughter of a wealthy wholesale grocer. She put her inheritance to good use. In 1924, she proposed to the Library of Congress that an auditorium be constructed in Washington, D.C., that would be dedicated to the performance of chamber music. A year later it was built, and Coolidge Auditorium at the Library of Congress still stands today.

Not content with just a superb venue for chamber music, Coolidge diligently commissioned new works to be played there. The list of important chamber pieces her foundation commissioned is impressive, and includes Bartok and Schoenberg string quartets, the original chamber versions of Copland’s Appalachian Spring, Stravinsky’s Apollo ballets, and modern works by American composers as diverse as Samuel Barber, Milton Babbitt, George Crumb and John Corigliano.

Coolidge was an amateur composer and accomplished pianist. Her passion for music and enthusiasm for the creation of new works was all the more remarkable considering that tragically she battled deafness from her mid-30s.

Music Played in Today's Program

Igor Stravinsky (1882 – 1971) Apollo ballet; Stockholm Chamber Orchestra; Esa-Pekka Salonen, cond. Sony Classical 46667

On This Day

Births

• 1841 - Polish pianist and composer Carl Tausig, in Warsaw;

Deaths

• 1847 - German composer Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy, age 38, in Leipzig;

• 1924 - French composer Gabriel Fauré, age 79, in Paris;

• 1953 - Music patroness and amateur composer Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge, age 89, in Cambridge, Mass.; She organized concerts and music festivals in Washington, D.C., and her Foundation commissioned works from Bartók, Malipiero, Schoenberg, Copland, Hanson, Piston, and many others; The recital hall at the Library of Congress bears her name;

• 1957 - French composer and writer, Marie Joseph Canteloube (de Malaret), age 78, in Grigny (Seine-et-Oise);

Premieres

• 1732 - Handel: opera “Catone” in London at the King’s Theater in the Haymarket (Gregorian date: Nov. 15);

• 1783 - Mozart: Symphony No. 36 ("Linz"), by the orchestra of Count Thun in Linz;

• 1863 - Berlioz: "Les Troyens à Carthage" (The Trojans at Carthage), Part 2 (Acts 3-5) of the opera "Les Troyens" (The Trojans), in Paris at the Théatre-Lyrqiue; The complete opera was not staged in France until 1920;

• 1876 - Brahms: Symphony No. 1, in Karlsruhe, Germany, with Felix Otto Dessoff conducting;

• 1883 - Chabrier: "Espana" in Paris, with Charles Lamoureux conducting;

• 1890 - Borodin: opera “Prince Igor” (completed and arranged posthumously by Rimsky-Korsakov and Glazunov), at the Mariinsky Theater in St. Petersburg (see Julian date: Oct. 23);

• 1922 - Hindemith: String Quartet No. 3, in Donauschingen (Germany), by the Amar Quartet (with Hindemith as the violist);

• 1924 - R. Strauss: opera "Intermezzo," in Dresden at the State Theater, conducted by Fritz Busch, with vocal soloists Lotte Lehmann (Christine Storch) and Josef Correck (Robert Storch);

• 1932 - Cowell: “Polyphonica” for 12 instruments, at the New School Auditorium in New York City, by the Pan American Association orchestra, Nicholas Slonimsky conducting; On this same concert was the premiere performance of “Those Everlasting Blues,” by Jerome Moross, with contralto Paula Jean Lawrence as the soloist;

• 1932 - Revueltas: "Ventanas" for orchestra, in Mexico City;

• 1948 - Schoenberg: "A Survivor from Warsaw" for narrator, chorus and orchestra, by the Civic Symphony of Albuquerque, New Mexico, with Kurt Frederick conducting;

• 1957 - José Serebrier: Symphony No. 1, by the Houston Symphony, Leopold Stokowski conducting;

• 1976 - Ned Rorem: “Women’s Voices,” at Alice Tully Hall in New York City, by mezzo Joyce Mathis and pianist Warren Wilson;

• 1993 - Bright Sheng: String Quartet No. 3, in Boulder, Colo., by the Takacs Quartet;

• 1993 - David Ward-Steinman: "Night Winds," for woodwind quintet, at the Festival of New American Music in Sacramento, Calif., by the Arioso Wind Quintet.