May 10 Dateline

Birthdays

1697 - Jean Marie Leclair (Elder), French Baroque composer and violinist. He is considered to have founded the French violin school. His brothers, the lesser-known Jean-Marie Leclair the younger (1703–77) as well as Pierre Leclair (1709–84) and Jean-Benoît Leclair (1714–after 1759), were also musicians. (Listen to Leclair's Violin Sonata Op. 9, performed by Simon Standage - here.)

1899 - Fred Astaire, American dancer, singer, actor and choreographer. He is widely regarded as the most influential dancer in the history of film. (Top 10 Iconic Fred Astaire Dance Scenes. Uploaded by MsMojo. Accessed May 10, 2019).

1900 - Cecilia Helena Payne-Gaposchkin (née Payne), British-born American astronomer and astrophysicist who proposed in her 1925 doctoral thesis that stars were composed primarily of hydrogen and helium, and that stars could be classified according to their temperatures. Her groundbreaking conclusion was initially rejected by early 20th century astronomy profession because it contradicted the scientific wisdom of the time, which held that there were no significant elemental differences between the Sun and Earth, that stars were made of the same blend of elements found on Earth, but Payne's creative application of astrophysics suggested otherwise... independent observations eventually proved she was correct. (Great Minds of Astronomy: Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin. YouTube, uploaded by SciShow Space. Accessed May 10, 2018. What Stars Are Made Of: The Life of Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkin. YouTube, uploaded by Center for Astrophysics. Accessed May 10, 2021.)

1916 - Milton Babbitt, American composer and music theorist, and teacher, noted for his serial and electronic music. By the end of the 1970s he began his third creative period by shifting his focus away from electronic music. From 1985 until his death in January 2011, he served as the Chairman of the BMI Student Composer Awards, the international competition for young classical composers.

1919 - Ernst Peter Johannes Maag, Swiss pianist and conductor. He was first conductor at the Düsseldorf Opera. Maag described his association with Wilhelm Furtwängler to be the most important in his life. His first appearance at the Royal Opera House Covent Garden was in 1959, with Mozart's Die Zauberflöte; in the same year he made his debut at the Glyndebourne Festival Opera in Mozart's Le nozze di Figaro. His U.S. debut was as guest conductor in 1959 of the Minneapolis Symphony Orchestra, and he made his U.S. opera debut two years later at the Lyric Opera of Chicago with Mozart's Così fan tutte. (The Legacy of Swiss Conductor, Peter Maag. Eloquence Classic. Mozart Piano Concerto No 20 K 466 D minor Maria Tipo Peter Maag. YouTube, uploaded by Sonorum Concentus Classicism. Accessed May 10, 2021.

1933 - Barbara Taylor Bradford, OBE, best-selling British-American novelist. Her debut novel, A Woman of Substance, was published in 1979 and has sold over 30 million copies worldwide. To date, she has written 35 novels—all bestsellers. Bradford's books have sold more than 92 million copies worldwide in more than 90 countries and 40 languages. Ten of her books have been made into television mini-series and television movies, produced by her husband, Robert Bradford. Her first novel, A Woman of Substance, became an enduring best-seller and according to Reuters, it ranks as one of the top-ten best-selling novels of all time. A Woman of Substance has been followed by 28 others—all best-sellers. Bradford writes about mostly ordinary women who go on to achieve the extraordinary.

1960 - Bono (born Paul David Hewson), KBE OL, Irish singer-songwriter, businessman, and philanthropist. He is best known as the lead vocalist and primary lyricist of rock band U2.

1965 - Linda Evangelista, Canadian fashion model and one of the top supermodels from the 1990s, described as the "Chameleon" of the fashion industry. She is regarded as one of the most accomplished and influential models of all time, featured on over 700 magazine covers. Evangelista is primarily known for being the longtime "muse" of photographer Steven Meisel.

1970 - Gabriela Montero, Venezuelan pianist, known in particular for her real-time improvisation of complex musical pieces on themes suggested by her audience and other sources, as well as for performances of standard classical repertoire. Montero has performed with the New York Philharmonic; debuted with Lorin Maazel, Los Angeles Philharmonic; and the Philharmonia Orchestra at the Royal Festival Hall, among others. In recital, her engagements include, among others, the Edinburgh Festival, Vienna Konzerthaus, Klavier-Festival Ruhr, Alte Sendersaal Frankfurt, Kennedy Centre Washington, D.C., and at the ‘Progetto Martha Argerich’ Festival in Lugano where she is invited annually.

 

Lefties:
None known

 

More birthdays and historical events today, 10 May - On This Day.    

 

Historical Events

1534 - Jacques Cartier begins exploring Newfoundland. He is often described as one of the first Europeans to discover Canada.

1908 - The first Mother's Day observance takes place during church services in West Virginia and Philadelphia.

1924 - J. Edgar Hoover is appointed head of FBI.

1940 - Neville chamberlain resigns as the government head, having failed to preserve "Peace of our time." Winston Churchill becomes Prime Minister, saying his famous line: "I have nothing to offer but blood, toil, tears and sweat."   
 
1957 - Dmitry Shostakovich's Piano Concerto  No. 2 is first performed in Moscow, with his son, Maxim Shostakovich, conducting.

1981 - Francois Mitterrand defeats Valery Giscard d'Estaing to become President of France in the second round of presidential elections.

1995 - Britain lifts its 23-year ban on talks with Sinn Fein, the political wing of the IRA.

2012 -  Pope Benedict XVI extended the liturgical cult of German polymath, Benedictine Abbess St. Hildegard von Bingen to the entire Catholic Church in a process known as "equivalent canonization". She was a writer, composer, philosopher, Christian mystic, visionary, and polymath. She is one of the best-known composers of sacred monophony, as well as the most-recorded in modern history. Hildegard von Bongen has been considered in Europe to be the founder of scientific natural history in Germany. On 7 October 2012, he named her a Doctor of the Church, in recognition of "her holiness of life and the originality of her teaching." Born around the year 1098, exact date is uncertain. Sickly from birth, Hildegard is traditionally considered the youngest and tenth child, although there are records of only seven older siblings. In her Vita, Hildegard states that from a very young age she had experienced visions.

Gabriela Montero (born May 10, 1970) is a Venezuelan pianist, known in particular for her real-time improvisation of complex musical pieces on themes suggested by her audience and other sources, as well as for performances of standard classical repertoire.

Video Credit:

Shostakovich Plays Shostakovich - Piano Concerto No. 2 in F major, Op. 102. YouTube, uploaded by Classical Vault 1. Accessed May 10, 2017.

Resources:

1. Asiado, Tel. The World's Movers and Shapers. New Hampshire: Ore Mountain Publishing House (2005)

2. Britannica. www.britannica.com
3. Chambers Biographical Dictionary, 19th Ed. London: Chambers Harrap, 2011
4. Dateline. Sydney: Millennium House, (2006)
5. Grun, Bernard. The Timestables of History, New 3rd Revised Ed. Simon and Schuster/Touchstone (1991)
6. Wikipedia. en.wikipedia.org


(c) June 2007.  Updated May 10, 2023. Tel. Inspired Pen Web.  All rights reserved.