Artistic Anecdotes
by Leticia Marie Sanchez In light of the Getty Center‘s new exhibit, Michelangelo, Mind of the Master, an insight into the maestro that first appeared on Cultural Cocktail Hour a few years ago: As a teenager, Michelangelo Buonarroti suffered a…
Read MoreIn the spirit of the season Cultural Cocktail Hour will share a holiday favorite! In her revealing book, Secret Lives of the Great Composers, Elizabeth Lundy described a fruity fiasco between two rivals: opera composers, Giacomo Puccini and conductor Arturo Toscanini: “During the years…
Read MoreBy Leticia Marie Sanchez Cultural Cocktail Hour® is a registered Trademark In his Book of Musical Anecdotes, Norman Lebrecht relates a revealing incident from Verdi’s childhood. The seven-year-old Verdi, born into a modest family, once served as an altar boy…
Read More“Please don’t throw me out the window!! I’m a MAESTRO!” Does Procrastination lead to Defenestration? Professor Robert Greenberg, in a wonderful lecture for the Teaching Company, read a letter in which opera composer Gioachino Rossini (nicknamed “The Italian Mozart”) confessed his last minute…
Read MorePhilip Glass, the creative and celebrated modern composer, courageously blazed a trail despite all the absurdities facing artists. According to Elizabeth Lundy, in Secret Lives of Great Composers, Mr. Glass took on sundry jobs to pay the bills during the 60′s and…
Read Moreby Leticia Marie Sanchez According to Kathleen Krull, in her book “Lives of the Artists,” Henri Matisse subsisted on a strict diet of rice-only when he first started out as a painter. Not Rice-A-Roni. Just plain boiled rice. Matisse refused…
Read MoreCosima Liszt, the daughter of the illustrious composer Franz Liszt, married conductor and pianist Hans Von Bulow. While married to Von Bulow, she became pregnant three times with the offspring of German composer Richard Wagner, bearing Wagner three children: Isolde, Ava, and Siegfried. Although…
Read Moreby Leticia Marie Sanchez Salvador Dalí mastered the art of creating his own image. Dalí shocked audiences everywhere with his flamboyant persona. A limousine or taxi was just too dull for the outrageous surrealist. So Mr.…
Read MoreGuess Who’s Coming to Dinner? by Leticia Marie Sanchez Salvador Dalí s painting, “Le Cheval de Caligula” depicts Incitatus, pampered pony of blood-thirsty Roman emperor Caligula. The often-violent Caligula became so enraptured with his stallion that he giddily showered him with 18 servants,…
Read MoreSome celebrate BACH’s BIRTHDAY on March 21st, some on March 31st (due to the differences in the Gregorian and the Julian calendar). We here at Cultural Cocktail Hour celebrate BACH’s BIRTHDAY all month long! In honor of his birthday, here is an anecdote about the musical…
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